Communications
IO2 THE COMMONWEAL May 29, I929 in recent years, so that very probably if a copy of Francisco Bravo's Opera Medicinalia should come on the market, it would sell for more than $Io,ooo. We owe the...
...The argument derived from personal liberty can hardly be advanced with any degree of consistency by Dr...
...Ryan...
...Those provisions of the Volstead Act which forbid a person to manufacture, transport or possess liquor for his own use have been virtually repealed by the enforcement officers...
...Apparently there seems to be no internal reason assignable, as persons may be found who are susceptible of intoxication by liquors of less than 4 percent of alcoholic content, and others are found who are not affected by a larger amount with greater content...
...The title page and index for Volume IX of The Common-weal are now ready...
...Dr...
...COMMUNICATIONS T THE AMENDMENT AMENDED Washington, D. C. O the Editor :--In a recent issue of your esteemed publi- cation there appeared an article by Dr...
...o the Editor :--You say, "The Holy Father is once more a temporal sovereign...
...Arrange- ments have been made for binding Volume 1X in leather or cloth...
...Almost every group opposed to any law of our country sees at once a striking resemblance between itself and the patriot band that faced the British guns...
...Leon than to anyone else...
...A critical analysis of the citation will disclose that the following statements are either explicitly or inferentially con- tained therein : I. A line of demarkation is drawn between intoxicating liquors for home consumption and for purposes of sale...
...Are they utterly powerless to remove or mitigate the abomination...
...He finds a vast difference between fighting against a foreign tyranny and inciting our people, young and old, to react against a constitu- tional amendment, made in our own country by our own citizens, on a question debated for years, and finally carried through in a way provided for by the fundamental law of the land...
...It seems to be the ideal status for the Pope...
...if they make and keep it for their own use, they need have no fear that they are transgressing any moral law...
...The Volstead Act as a whole could, of course, be repealed or modified by a majority vote of Congress...
...4. Prohibition of such liquors for the purpose of sale con-taining alcohol in excess of one-half of one percent has no validity in morals...
...The only modification consistent with the Eighteenth Amendment would be an in-crease in the alcoholic content of beer...
...rarely do they any longer prosecute for these offenses persons who are known to refrain from selling liquors to others...
...Other federal laws are likewise addressed to individuals, as the pure food law, the law of correct weights and measures, of protection to migratory birds, against counterfeiting, etc...
...Now there is a mad scramble for them, so that even later editions of the first book printed in Mexico, Bishop Zumarraga's Doctrina Breve, printed as late as I57I, have sold for more than $3,000...
...Leon had no idea of collecting books for the sake of the advancement in price that would come, and indeed until recent years there was comparatively little interest in books printed in Mexico...
...Ad...
...2. There is no explanation given for drawing the line of maximum alcoholic content at 4 percent...
...Dr...
...They can continue to demand referendums on modification or repeal...
...cannot be questioned that the right to barter, sell or trade .nything not inherently evil on the part of any individual con- ~titutes a natural right that is inalienable...
...The most objectionable side to Dr...
...b~truct action, but is now a 4is-~ '-advantage " its hasty ,- ~ T "EMBOTTLED INTELLECTUALS" Boston, Mass...
...as this is the only reason alleged, it must be placed in qualifying apposition to the accompanying phrase, "that [these provisions] never had a shadow of validity in morals," and this form of expression, in accordance with all the accepted canons of moral terminology is equivalent to saying "inherently evil...
...Of course these tyrannical provisions never had a shadow of validity in morals...
...These will be sent upon request...
...Ryan further states: "It [the Eighteenth Amendment] is practically the only provision in the constitution which is addressed to individuals, which restricts individual liberty, and it is absolutely the only one which confers police power upon the national government...
...O the Editor :--Comparing the gentlemen (and I sup-pose the ladies, too) who are opposed to prohibition with the patriots of I776 is old stuff...
...but whatever is inherently evil, or as he puts it quite succinctly, "never had a shadow of validity in morals," does not permit of a parity of matter, as a dis-qualification of this kind affects the substance irrespective of degree of content, be it 4 percent or 40 percent...
...As to the practicability of the proposition, it may be observed that the home manufacture of a wholesome beverage requires equipment and expenditure of time which the ordinary citizen can hardly afford...
...Information on binding will be given upon application to the offices of The Commonweal...
...Since prohibition by a majority vote has become the organic law of the land, the government as well as the states is morally bound to enforce it by "concurrent power...
...These, however, were not under consideration in the article reviewed...
...and to him the "embottled intellectuals" do not look a bit like "the Continentals in their ragged regimentals," however much they may appear so in their own eyes...
...Ryan's admission, a lesser amount of alcoholic content is morally admissible, no valid reason can be adduced "ex ratione objecti" which would render a larger amount inherently evil and subject to absolute prohibition...
...4. This deduction which Dr...
...We owe the proper appre- ciation of it more to Dr...
...and I have no doubt that Judge Lindsey, with his companionate marriage, and Margaret Sanger, with her birth control, feel very much like the embattled farmers at Concord, and look upon the rest of us as Adams and John Hancock looked upon King George...
...There are other reasons of a biological, sociological and economic character which justify reasonable legal restriction but never absolute prohibition as now existing...
...It is r-.9 that a small numbe ~t...
...They can continue to denounce the anti-democratic character of the Eighteenth Amendment and the enormous evils that it has inflicted upon American society...
...Now as, according to Dr...
...Anti-trust laws may be enacted to hinder restraint of trade and revenue and customs taxation may be imposed for fiscal benefit...
...Here in Boston the people who stand for a wide-open policy with regard to obscene literature smugly compare themselves with the antl-tyrants of the early days of the repubic...
...T THE STATUS OF THE HOLY FATHER Toronto, Canada...
...John A. Ryan on prohibition entitled: Who Shall Obey the Law...
...Ryan as it militates with equal force against his own rule of a 4 percent maximum allowance...
...Neither does a greater amount of alcoholic content justify bsolute prohibition for the reasons stated above, although it is not to be denied that greater stringency of regulatory inhibi- tion is eminently advisable...
...Leon would have been very much interested in this, not for financial reasons but because he would have been glad to know that the precious early Mexican books to which he had been so zealously calling atten- tion had finally come into their own due mead of recognition among bibliophiles...
...At the same time, however, it is conceded that it is not an absolute one, but as it is by its very nature a public transaction, it becomes amenable to reasonable regulation by the civil power which assumes the obligation of protecting and not prohibiting such a right...
...If they buy liquor they can feel assured that they are violating no civil law...
...It is precisely this sort of legislation which marks prohibition as a reversion to the taboo system of primi- tive peoples...
...Ryan writes" "What is the legal situation respecting these two enactments...
...Aside altogether from the actual right or wrong, the wisdom or unwisdom, of the amendment itself, he is keen-eyed enough to see the difference between these two propositions, and keen- minded enough not to be confused by the sophistry...
...But he has the preroga:l tive of extra-territoriality, and as supreme visible Head of the Catholic Church has the status of a sovereign independent of temporal sovereigns in the exercise of his spiritual functions...
...They all have the same cry of fighting for freedom...
...As a matter of fact the heroic pose is very tiresome, whether it is assumed by detestable birth-controllers or respectable anti- prohibitionists...
...Ad...
...Dr...
...DEr:Is A. McCARTHY...
...In order to be at all suitable or desirable, wine would have to contain such a high content of alcohol that it could not honestly be interpreted as non-intoxicating by any court...
...Outright repeal without any substitute legislation is obviously impracticable...
...By no means...
...The fact that the Eighteenth Amendment confers the police power of the several states upon the federal government need not be viewed with alarm...
...The mere saying that they are fighting for the fundamentals of freedom, even as the men of I776 fought for them, does not carry conviction...
...It is not easy to define exactly 'aough " ~ ~ht his status today...
...The anti-prohibitionists, respectable as they are, are in the same boat in this manner as the people who are not at all respectable from the Catholic point of view...
...A CATHOLIC...
...3. This statement is also proposed seemingly as axiom- atic by Dr...
...However, it could only be seriously considered on the assumption that liquor in excess of 4 percent of alcoholic content is inherently evil...
...Ryan is careful in leaving to the discernment of his readers, but which he freely admitted in a rejoinder to the editor of the True Voice (May 3) is of like quality with the piz.w:se from which it is derived...
...It has not the merit of originality...
...But one thing is plain: he has renounced ?i" h all claim to that temporal sovereignty which consisted in juris- diction over the papal states...
...Ryan says in conclusion: "What course is open to the millions of honest men and women who detest the tyranny and toryism of national prohibition...
...Of course whisky and all other spiritous liquors have sufficient alcohol to intoxicate...
...As our democratic form of government is based upon the "appeal to reason" as final arbiter, it cannot be conceived as fundamentally wrong to cede this power to the national government...
...To the average American there is no resem-blance whatever between the anti-British patriots of the Revo- lution and the anti-prohibitionists of today...
...Having admitted that liquor with an alcoholic content of less than 4 percent is not inherently evil, no valid reason can be offr ed for proscribing such liquor for the purpose of sale...
...He has now no territory in the civil or political sense, no subjects in the civil or political order, no jurisdiction in civil matters...
...A critical review of the article may aid in bringing about that adjustment of this impor- tant situation in which we are all genuinely and constructively interested--the making of America sober without making it dry...
...Ad...
...Ryan's proposal consists in this, that its provisions would effectively close the only May 29, r9:z9 THE COMMONWEAL ro 3 avenue open to a possible solution of the question by preventing the sale of liquors under government control...
...They all do it...
...While one must admit that his treatment of the question is very interesting and pregnant with constructive thought, yet upon close ex-amination the distinguished author's course of reasoning does not seem to be quite convincing...
...If it be so, then the other eighteen are of the s~me class, and if they be such, then the constitution itself ~: ich devises this meat}~ "s likewise anti-democratic...
...Dr...
...I. The reason advanced for this statement is to the effect that such a measure is tyrannical...
...3. Prohibition of such liquors for home use but containing alcohol in excess of 4 percent has no validity in morals...
...The fallacy of the whole argument rests on the assumption that the ethical evaluation of intoxication is to be based exclusively on the nature of the object without taking cognizance of the human factor and the set of circumstances modifying every form of human activity...
...2. Prohibition of manufacture, transport or possession of intoxicants for home use having an alcoholic content of 4 per- cent or less has validity in morals...
...It will hardly do to decry the Eighteenth Amendment as anti-democratic...
...Evidently "amount" and "content" are two different realities which are persistently confused by the defenders of a peculiar kind of logic underlying the Eighteenth Amendment...
...Ad...
...A beverage of that nature containing not more than 4 percent alcohol might be construed by the Supreme Court as non-intoxlcatlng, and it would probably satisfy the thirst of many thousands of drinkers...
...and there is also no doubt a respectable number of total abstainers...
...IO2 THE COMMONWEAL May 29, I929 in recent years, so that very probably if a copy of Francisco Bravo's Opera Medicinalia should come on the market, it would sell for more than $Io,ooo...
Vol. 10 • May 1929 • No. 4
