It is said that we cannot look to legislation to promote
reform in this matter, that it is in moral pressure alone that
relief can be found. No doubt it is to the latter that we must
look for an abiding reform, but legislation can do a great deal



3i8 NEO-MALTHUSIANISM

in lessening poverty from drink. It can enact that when the
head of a family or others are ruining themselves and all
belonging to them by their drunkenness, they can be tried by
a jury of their neighbours, and compelled to undergo seclusion
in homes for inebriates, supported by voluntary contributions,
under Government supervision. It is lamentable to see
children brought to beggary by their parents giving way to
drunkenness and debauchery. The law can reduce the number
of the houses of temptation, but that it does not do, nor make
any serious attempt to do so. Local option has been tried
and failed, as it always will and must, for it only provokes
hostility from all quarters, and creates invidious distinctions.
There are some localities so degraded that their inhabitants
would vote for an increase of facilities for getting drunk, not a
diminution. Besides, where could a successful line of demar-
cation be successfully drawn between those wards or parishes
which decided that drink could not be obtained within their
boundaries and those who did not so decide ? The inevitable
result would take place, that on one side of the street all the
public-houses would be open, and on the other all would be
closed ; some publicans, through no fault of their own, would
be ruined, and others enriched.
The only way in which the matter can be successfully
grappled with is to allot public-houses according to population.
