as Chairman, brought up the First Report of the Select Committee on Internal Arrangements, as follows—

E. G. JANSEN, Chairman.

Unless notice of objection is given on or before 24th March, the report will be considered as adopted.

brought up the report of the Joint Committee on the use of Afrikaans in Bills, Acts and official documents of Parliament.

Report and evidence to be printed and considered on 25th March,

May I ask leave to make a personal explanation? I wish to explain that last night, as I came into the House, the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) accused me of great discourtesy in leaving my place while an hon. member was speaking. I entirely agree with the right hon. member that, except under certain circumstances, one does owe the courtesy of listening to remarks any hon. member may make after one has spoken oneself. It has always been my practice ever since I have been a member of this House to show that courtesy to hon. members whose remarks are addressed to something I have had to say. The only reason I departed from my usual practice last night was because the hon. member, to whom I had listened for some minutes, stated, after addressing himself to remarks that I had made, that he proposed to ignore in the further course of his remarks anything I had said as in his opinion it was not worth dealing with. Under those circumstances, I think there can be no discourtesy in my leaving my place as the hon. member had specifically said that he was not going to address himself to my remarks.

Was that the reason you all left the House?

I am explaining for myself, and that was the reason why I left my place. I felt myself entirely liberated from any duty to attend, having been told already that no further reference was going to be made to my remarks.

I would like to ask—

The hon. Minister’s statement cannot be discussed now.

Arising out of the Minister’s statement I only wish to say that although the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) might have had no further reference to make to what the hon. Minister said, other people might have referred to it and the hon. Minister would not have been here to listen.

Yes I should; I should have come back. I had only gone for a cup of coffee.

I move, as an unopposed motion—

That Notice of Motion No. 1 be now dealt with.

This is a private members’ day, and it is not usual on private members’ day to make these motions.

I move—

seconded.

Agreed to.

If there is a matter in which I can truthfully say that I came to the House with an open mind, i.e., before I asked myself the question whether I was for or against, then it is this matter. I have already heard speeches, and read about it, and naturally paid attention to this matter, because everyone in the country who is seriously minded and who sees what evils and misery result from the abuse of drink, everyone who means well by our people and our children, will give his attention to the matter. And I must say that when I used to think superficially about the matter I inclined to the side of local option. This is the means which is suggested to combat the evil. It has the high-sounding name of being a democratic measure; it is meant to give people the opportunity to decide for themselves what they want and to prevent that the will of other people shall be forced on them. But when I came here and commenced to thoroughly go into this measure it became clear to me that there were great difficulties connected with the carrying out of it. I began to doubt if the proper carrying out of it was possible. I begin to doubt still more about the efficacy of it and whether it will produce the desired result we should so much like to see. When I go still further into the matter I begin to doubt if we are justified from a moral point of view in subjecting a matter such as this to local option. Let us look at the measure. The reasons that have been advanced in its favour I need not repeat here. I do not think in the first place of the teetotaler. We know what they want. They do not conceal it. As the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) said, their objective is total prohibition, even if that comes by a detour. But I refer to the argument of those who are against the abuse of drink and are concerned about it. One was always pointed to the evils connected with it in the Western Province. One is always told how drunkenness is increasing in the Western Province and statistics are quoted to prove it. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout has read letters to show what the conditions in the Western Province are. He has read an extract from the newspaper to show that a murder was committed as a result of drunkenness. He has also read a letter from Mrs. MacGregor who writes on behalf of 1,500 coloured women about the conditions in the Western Province. Everybody notices the misery of these conditions. Suppose that is so, and suppose that local option is adopted, we will admit that in other districts where the evil has not spread so much, and where there are not so many licensed houses, we will have a lessening of the evil if there should be a further reduction of conteens and if they eventually disappear. We will also admit that where the opportunity of obtaining drink is lessened the man who is not exactly a hard drinker will not take so much trouble to get drink and there will be a reduction of drunkenness, even the drunkard will not be able to get it. But what will be the position in the Western Province? Can we think that in the Western Province where people produce the drink that they will vote in favour of local option? Can we think that those who are against the abuse or rather the misuse of drink will get the majority? Not one of us can say that we are going to make any change. But it is just here where they say that the bad ulcer, or the cancer, is. If we are now going to adopt means which will bring about an improvement in other places, but not here, what does it help? One then acts like a doctor who has to treat a bad ulcer, but who only attends to the healthy portions of the patient’s body and leaves the bad place alone. We can thus accept that the conditions in the Western Province will remain more or less as they are at present. What will happen then? We shall not long have local option before the neighbouring districts which are dry, and which have great trouble with the smuggling of drink from the “wet” districts, will begin to agitate to exercise influence in those portions. The rest of the country will then come and say that we will go further. We shall then get this impossible position, that where we ask for local option because it is a democratic measure, the people in their turn on the ground of the doctrine of democracy will say: No; the State should interfere and compel the minority in the general interest of the country to protect the rest of the country. That is the doctrine of the democracy that the minority must yield to the majority. We shall then hear: Away with local option. Now hosannas are shouted to local option. In a few days we shall hear: Crucify him. So far for local option itself. Now see what the consequences will be. Well, our first duty will then be to see that drink is not taken from the “wet” districts to the other where local option prevails. Because this will spoil the whole position there. We shall have to call in police and have a whole cordon to control the removal of drink. We know what great difficulties are connected with the fighting of smuggling. Let us, e.g., take the happenings in South-West with reference to the embargo on the import of cattle. We know that we could not stop the import of cattle there in broad daylight. What will, then, happen with drink, which can be carried in any way and at night? What will be the consequence? It causes friction between various districts in the country. The greatest division will be caused, and it will not stop there. The division will be carried into the various circles. We all know how bitter a conflict about local interests can become. It will be especially bitter when it touches the means of livelihood of people. Those who are concerned in it will become so embittered that we will never get rid of it again. A general election will be a very small thing in comparison with this fight. It will not only be confined to local option. It will infiltrate into the Town Council, into the school, the church and the colleges. No place will be exempted, and in instances where local option is carried by a small majority, where there is a small minority, we shall have many other things. There a boycott will be set up. The minority will want to resist, and people will follow one another. Then we see what may arise. Is it not paying a great deal for something of which the efficacy is extremely doubtful? Is the price not too great for what we should attain? I can say nothing else, but—no! the price is too much, and it is risking too much. There is another matter. It is openly said by the supporters of local option that they aim at total prohibition. They want to kill the production of wine and spirituous liquor. It is not honourable to beat about the bush. If we, as a people, are convinced that the making of wine and other drink is wrong, then we, as people, should like one man come out frankly on the matter. We must then pay compensation, and not try to escape it, as the case is here. If local option goes before prohibition, it will be years before we are there. It will be a sort of long-drawn-out death under which our people will be allowed to suffer. It will not be easy for a person to convert his farming into something else. We had a nice instance of this in ostrich farming. The people held convulsively to ostrich farming, and they suffered, and we will always have people who stick to a thing. It will also happen with the wine farmers, and we would allow these people to suffer if we don’t compensate them. I now come to the general question. Can we justify local option from a moral standpoint? The total abstainers say that the use and manufacture of drink is an evil. Others of us, nonabstainers, say that drunkenness is an evil. The use of wine is good, but the abuse thereof is bad. Be this as it may, both these things are done in the Western Province. Can we now leave the continuance or not of those evils to the people in the Western Province who are interested? That is my question. Is it right that we as a country should come to these people and say they must decide whether the evil of which they are guilty shall continue? Take e.g. the question of the smoking of dagga. If there is a district in the country where dagga grows luxuriantly and where it can be used we would regard it as an evil. Is it then right of us to say that those people must decide whether the evil shall continue in the land? This tolerance or not of an evil in the land we cannot leave to a small circle. Let us now come nearer home. If we accept the principle that we can leave the option to a small circle or to a group of people then we can make the circle just a little narrower and say that the family can choose what it will do. If we draw the circle still narrower then we come to the individual and we say that he can have the choice whether he will continue the evil or not. He can then decide if he wants to intoxicate himself or not and we can say nothing. It therefore seems to me that we cannot subject an evil to local option. Now you ask if local option is not acceptable what must we do then? There is prohibition. I do not want to go into that. We have heard from the hon. the Prime Minister how impossible that is. If I could see the possibility of it I would vote for it because in my heart I am for it. But if we investigate the matter then one meets all kinds of difficulties and impossibilities. In America they have a whole fleet which costs millions to stop smuggling and they have extended the boundary limit to 15 miles from the coast. In our country it would be still more difficult where we have prickly pears, wild peaches, etc., over the whole extent of South Africa. If we think of these things we shall find that the matter is so impossible that we shall need the whole white population to guard against smuggling, and the illegal manufacture of drink. Every stonekraal and porcupine hole will be a factory. We talk of the plague of locusts which it is difficult to fight. I say all the plagues of Egypt would not be so difficult to eradicate as the application of prohibition in South Africa. The other matter is that of compensation. We must not suddenly jump round where for generations we have allowed an industry to continue and where the State has protected it and even made money advances to encourage it, we shall have to pay compensation. It has been said that the farmers can plant fruit trees. Fruit trees grow slowly, and it will be long before the people can make a living out of it. The heavy costs connected with it therefore exclude prohibition. If local option is not effective and if prohibition is excluded what remains? There is still the alternation of the control by our liquor laws. It seems to me that this is the proper solution. Reflection is often made upon the condition in the Western Province. The drunkenness is not amongst the farmers. I was for three years travelling amongst farmers and have seen that it is an untrue statement that drunkenness is more serious amongst the wine farmers. There is less drunkenness with them than amongst other sections of the population. The drunkenness is not amongst the wine farmers’ servants either. Drunken workmen are seldom seen on the farms. But on Saturday one finds them along the road. They come from the canteens. That is where the ulcer is. It is the canteens and the sale of drink by the bottle which causes all the trouble. It must be changed. But the solution is not local option. The State must step in and we want control in the matter, because it is in the interest of the country. To sum up. Local option seems to me to be inacceptable because it will not be effective and because it will cause unnecessary divisions. Local option will be a very doubtful experiment. It is a great risk and where we are about to make another experiment to improve he liquor laws it is not necessary. The matter has already taken enough time in the House and therefore I move a further amendment—

I second the amendment. The hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie) wants to send the Bill to a Select Committee before the second reading. There is little difference between that and sending the Bill to a Select Committee after the second reading because everything will in any case depend upon the constitution of the committee. I don’t want to compromise myself at all with reference to the principle. The principle of the Bill is total prohibition, although it goes under the name of local option. The Bill, provides that at the request of ten voters of an area a vote must take place there upon the question whether the number of licences should remain or whether there should be a reduction of licences. But the voters have not the right of voting for an increase of licences. Where is the democracy and voice of the people? Even if only 10 per cent. of the voters—say 100 out of a thousand—go to the poll and the total abstainers get a majority of a single vote —say 51 against 49—then all the licences are cancelled. In that way you can rob a hotel-keeper who has put £10,000 into his building of nearly all that money. Hotels are only built on the strength of the licences. Supporters of the Bill repeatedly pointed out last year that Scotland had introduced local option but forgot to add that in that country at least 35 per cent. of the voters must go to the poll and at least 55 per cent. of them must vote for a desired alteration before the alteration can be given effect to. The Scotch law thus gives to the investor a guarantee against a change. The Transvaal Act on local option goes still further than the Scots law, and provides that the vote will be of no value unless 50 per cent. of the voters to go to the poll. So drastic is the proposal of the member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) that one may not even sell here in the dry areas—not even ginger beer if it contains more than 2 per cent. alcohol. His Bill also provides that although you may produce strong drink in a district declared dry you may not sell it there. If your neighbour wants to buy your drink, then you must first take it over the boundary of the district. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout wants to go further. He said in his speech that the Select Committee which will be appointed can consider whether a voter in a “dry district” should be allowed to bring any strong drink into it. He thus wishes from the very commencement to introduce local veto in such an area. Is this freedom? But that hon. member is consistent, because he has openly acknowledged that he is in favour of total prohibition. This is the attitude of almost all the leading supporters of this measure. The father of the Bill was the late Mr. Theo. Schreiner, the man who, in 1886, travelled through the whole of the Transvaal to advocate prohibition. As a further proof that total prohibition is intended, there is the fact that the supporters now refer to America where there is total prohibition instead of Scotland, where local option is in force, and Pussyfoot Johnson, who was brought here in support of the measure is an abstainer —a prohibitionist from the United States, not a Scotsman from Scotland. The hon. member for Winburg (Dr. van der Merwe) is one of those who has referred to America, but he was in such an unhappy state while he was speaking that I felt inclined to remind him of what is said in Proverbs: “Give wine to him who is bitterly depressed.” I thought that the hon. member for Winburg when he rose would support his arguments by quotations from the Bible as he is a clergyman, but he was very careful to remain silent, about biblical teaching. Why?

It was not necessary to quote from the Bible.

No, the Bible would not help you at all. The Rev. Mr. Cook, the chief agitator in favour of local option, says forsooth that his object in this Bill is not prohibition. Why did he then in a letter to “Die Burger” advise the wine farmers to dig up a third of their vineyards every two years? They cannot deny it, total prohibition is the thing that is intended. In Scotland local option has been tried since 1920. All the great supporters in this country then referred to Scotland and prophesied a satisfactory result. All Scotchmen, so we understood, would still be thankful. Why do these leaders not refer us to Scotland any longer? Because local option has turned out a failure there According to the latest polls, there are now more people in Scotland against it than before. The supporters of the measure, while they take America as a model, have carefully forgotten such countries as Holland, England, Belgium, Denmark and Germany. I was some time ago in all these countries and could get strong drink everywhere. In Holland, where no wine is made, there are just as many licensed houses as cigar shops and that is saying a great deal. Only in one of those countries could I not get stronger drink than wine.

In which one?

If I remember rightly, it was Belgium. Nowhere in those countries did I, during the five weeks I was there, see a drunken person.

Not in England either?

I do not say that there is no drunkenness. I only allege that I did not notice any case. If America is to be taken as the example of the beneficial result of local; option or prohibition, then it is an unhappy example. Total prohibition was introduced there in 1920, since then, according to official figures, crimes have increased. The “International Prison Commissioner” says of Massachusetts that in 1920 there were 37,160 convictions for drunkenness. In the following year this was 59,585, and in 1922 it was 75,655. In 56 towns of a population of more than 24,600 in the United States, 130 more people were arrested for drunkenness in 1921 than in 1920. The prisons became fuller. The population of the Federal Prisons increased by 83 per cent. between 1917 and 1922. The hospitals became fuller of alcoholic patients, and there were more deaths from alcoholism. The illicit drink traffic could not be suppressed. The Bahama Islands, which are near the American coast, in 1918 only imported wine to the value of £867 and spirits £6,370. In 1922 that country imported wine to the value of about £27,000 and spirits £1,003,721. It is said by our opponents that America has saved money in police and gaol expenditure. The truth is that the maintenance of the total prohibition cost America £6,000,000 in 1924, and that the gaols were fuller than ever. According to reports from the director of prohibition, no less than 150,000,000 gallons, according to his calculation, of alcohol was consumed in the United States in 1922. This is 20,000,000 gallons more than before prohibition. And 29,000,000 gallons of that drink was poison. The Government moreover doesn’t get a penny in taxation out of it. In 1921, according to the chief medical examiner, deaths in consequence of acute alcoholism in greater New York increased by 62 per cent. over 1920. According to the American total prohibition department, 500 deaths took place through alcohol in 1922. In Philadelphia, where pure smuggled whisky is difficult to obtain, while in Detroit, on the Canadian border, only two deaths took place. No wonder that in 1923 President Harding declared that illicit consumption of liquor had become a menace to the public. The report of the chief prohibition official of the United States for 1922 further declared: “The toll of lives that the smuggling of drink takes right through the country cannot be fixed definitely—not even by those who are aware of the facts.” So much for America, which is held up to us as a model! There is prohibition in the Transvaal so far as natives and coloured people are concerned. How has it worked there? In Johannesburg and Pretoria alone, during the years 1903-’17, no less than 8,214 white people were arrested for illicit sale of drink, and 138,237 other people. This gives 9,216 per year for 15 years. The convictions for drunkenness in Johannesburg alone for the eight years, 1910-’17, were Europeans 7,450, natives and coloureds 24,668. What good has prohibition done there? A great deal is talked about the drunkenness in the Western Province. There is, however, much less drunkenness here than in Johannesburg. If I remember rightly, contraventions of the liquor laws are responsible for about 40 per cent. of the Transvaal total, while in the Cape Province it is no more than 6 per cent.

For what year are you giving the figures?

For 1914. It is the last year that returns are obtainable for on that point.

From whom do you get the figures?

From a statement given by Mr. Roos, now auditor-general. The measure is unfair not only against the hotel keepers, but also against the wine farmers, grain farmers, brewers and workmen. The wine farmers have invested about £3,000,000 in their farms. What will their farms be worth if the Bill becomes law? There is a section which provides that the Bill will only come into force in five years’ time, so that farmers can have time to plant other things in place of their vineyards. But what would their farms be worth in the meantime? Confidence in their value will receive a shock. They will all immediately depreciate. The brewers have invested £5,000,000 in their undertaking. It has been calculated that in the Western Province 100,000 souls earn their livelihood from the wine industry and that, altogether, over £2,000,000 in wages is paid out by the wine and beer trade. Is it fair that the wine farmers, who have done so much for education, for missions, for the church, for civilization and the development of the country, should be treated as if their work was criminal? If it is a sin to produce wine, why then are the wine farmers generally the most blessed portion of the boer population in South Africa? They are, moreover, the more sober. Sin punishes itself. Are the wine farmers a depraved class of people? The grain farmers must also suffer if the Bill is adopted, because the brewers buy about 112,000 bags of barley annually. I hope and expect that my friends from the north will to-day all stand by the wine farmer and continue a legitimate industry which has already been in existence 250 years. In the old Cape days the cattle farmer, grain farmer and wine farmer used to stand together. The one helped the other. They formed a triangular bond. I hope that bond still exists. The wine farmers do not complain if money is spent on locusts or jackals or scab, although they also have to pay a portion of the expenditure. Now the other farmers in turn must stand by the wine farmer and not alienate his sympathy.

I think the hon. member who has just spoken may be congratulated on the fight he has put up for the principles he holds in regard to this Bill. I have found that if you want to know anything about any other country the best thing to do is to get into communication with a newspaper man. As a rule they can generally tell you what is happening. My hon. friend has referred to America, and I should like to read him the letter by a newspaper man who has been right through America and writes articles for one of the best-known papers in America. From this letter it is clear that, while there is a certain amount of liquor in America, the position is getting better as the years go by. Now here is a telegram from the woman in the Free State—

That is from the Orange Vrouwe Vereeniging; they represent the women of the Free State, who stand behind this Bill; and what the women say to-day the men will probably say to-morrow. Here is a letter from the Rev. A. Stockenstrom, representing the Dutch Reformed Synod, which stands as one man behind this Bill. This means that the women and the greatest Church in the Free State are behind this Bill. The Prime Minister made the following remark: “This is something about which, in the name of the Government, I must say something or otherwise neglect my duty.” Evidently, however, the Prime Minister did not represent the views of the Government, seeing that four members of his cabinet—Dr. Malan, Mr. Creswell, Gen. Kemp and Mr. Boydell—are for the Bill. So that he was only giving his own views. The Prime Minister also argued that this Bill was not a democratic measure, but local option or abolition cannot be forced upon the people against their will, and you cannot legislate in advance of public opinion. It is the people who will decide, and that is democracy. Liquor licences will never be abolished until the people themselves so decide; that is the point. My hon. friend here takes exception to the fact that the Bill only calls for a majority, but there are hon. members who have been returned to this House by a majority of only one, or even by a minority vote in a three-cornered election. And now they complain because they want a majority vote. They say it is wrong not to make clear that this Bill would lead to prohibition, but it was not the local option people who brought about prohibition in America; it was brought about by the captains of industry. For many years the local option party carried on their movement, but it was only when the captains of industry exerted their forces through Congress that prohibition was passed—the first time probably that capital has done a good thing for the world. And this is the acid test: If America to-day were what my hon. friends say it is, why does not the Congress turn down the law and expunge this amendment? It is no good talking wildly; these are hard facts. If America—the greatest country in the world, with a population of 110 millions—were as drunk and blind and doing the things that hon. members say, why do people standing in the van of civilization not say, “We are going back to the old state of affairs?” The answer is that America has become sober. The town clerk of Bloemfontein, Mr. Logan, a most intelligent man, on whom I can absolutely rely, told me that when he went to America he could get a whisky and soda at any house where he was entertained. There is, he told me, a certain amount of liquor in America, but America today is 95 per cent. dry. He went further and said that the captains of industry, whom he saw, from Ford downwards, said they would never go back to the old conditions, because their men to-day had money in the savings bank and were driving motor cars. These employers were paying the highest wages in the world, and there was virtually no unemployment. An argument that is always used in this House is that it is not fair to the farmer if you have local option, but the farming community of America stands behind prohibition. My friend met an American Senator, who said: “I voted against this Bill, because I always liked my drink; but to-day I do not have it; I am not going to break the law. The second point is that if you do have a drink in America you never know what you are taking. It may send you blind; it may be wood alcohol. The third reason is that I have five sons. That is the point. Men who work on newspapers at night know what happens. First there is a little drink, and that goes on until you are drinking too much. If a young man never sees drink he is not going to run about and look for it. He is not going to worry about it, and he is not going to drink methylated spirits. It is the man who you can never get rid of that will do that. We want to save the young men. If America is sober and England, Europe and South Africa are drunken, what hope have we in the markets of the world? We all know that the man who is sober is better than the man of “the morning after the night before.” If America is sober it will lead and beat us. I am not afraid of the position in America, and I am going to give you some official figures from America. They are saving £200,000,000 per month and spending a similar amount every month on new insurance since prohibition came in. Every working day America is paying off £750,000 of public debt. There are 15½ million motor cars, and America spends daily £600,000 on outdoor sports, picture shows, etc. 205,000 homes were built in the first six months of prohibition. America is eliminating the slums, and America is a country with a large number of different classes of people. We are creating slums and England is doing so also. The penitentiary population is 5,000 less than before prohibition. I challenge my hon. friend to disprove these figures. Alcoholic insanity has been reduced by two-thirds. A number of gaols have been closed, and 90 per cent. of the institutions for the cure of drunkenness have been closed. The average of industrial accidents numbers 250,000 less than in the days before the 18th amendment. Then in regard to the churches: There may be some people who sneer at the mention of “churches,” but I do not sneer at them. The churches have had an average of 3,000 new members a day joining up since prohibition. The churches have spent £50,000,000 on new buildings. Money that used to go into the saloons is now going into the churches. It is no good my going on, because members have made up their minds how they are going to vote, but it is just as well to explode this idea that drunkenness is the best thing.

Who said that.

I will tell you who said it. Anybody who says that drunkenness is not on the increase and that our gaols are not full is saying that. I am not a temperance man, but I say I am a prohibition man, not for my own sake, but for the sake of my sons who are coming after me. The Prime Minister said there were five or six million kaffirs and that recently, according to the Johannesburg police, the prisons were full of smugglers. What is the good of telling us that the prisons will be full? They are full already. So full that the Government had to get some of the prisoners out the other day. The Prime Minister goes on to say that the kaffirs will be getting smuggled liquors, but they are to-day getting smuggled liquors under the present system. They will do so in the future, but nobody says the principle of prohibition is an absolute success. Christianity is not an absolute success. Why not? Because it has never been tried, but if local option comes to this country it will make things better than before. The Transvaal experiment is talked about, but is there any Government in South Africa prepared to go back on what is being done in the Transvaal? Nobody can put the Transvaal on the same level as the Cape. Is there any responsible man in the House who will bring forward a Bill to put the Transvaal on the same basis as the Cape in regard to the sale of liquor? Then it is said that the wine farmers would be ruined. I am sorry for them. I admit we have men in this House, some of the leading men we have got, who stand high in the estimation of South Africa and belong to some of the best families, and who say the wine farmers will be ruined. That has not proved to be the case in California.

They have the market.

We are in a better position than any other part of the world for markets. You have just sent Mr. Pienaar overseas because there are good markets waiting. If my friend is going to lay down the principle that there are no more markets in the world for South African products, the best thing we can do is shut up shop. The Californian farmers are better off to-day than ever they were before. The argument is used that the wine farmer is never a drunkard. Nobody ever said he was. But he sells the stuff which makes people drunk, and this you must prohibit. In regard to unemployment, experience shows to-day that America is the only place without unemployment. The 4,000,000 out-of-works after the war were quickly absorbed. My hon. friend the Minister of Justice says that bores become pleasant persons after a few drinks. Everybody admits that, but what about the pleasant fellow who gets drunk and goes back home and knocks his wife and children about? We have seen too many homes ruined. It is generally the most pleasant fellow, the nicest fellow, who goes back when he gets a little bit too much liquor and breaks up the happy home. There is no doubt about that, in fact you cannot argue that point, to say that the bore would turn into a pleasant fellow. Neither, sir, am I going into the question of compensation. I do not agree with the hon. member who introduced the Bill. I say there should be no compensation. You can example America and say that if you do the same things here, hotels will get worse. It is not so. Mr. Dudley in America said the 18th amendment if it were passed it would destroy the hotel business. It has done nothing of the sort. It has turned hotel management into a science and hotels are run at a profit by conducting them on the same “merchantising” plan as any other “merchantising” concern. What do we find in South Africa? At the expense of losing the vote of the hotel managers in South Africa, I say that the worst hotels in the world are in South Africa. Why? Because the man who runs the hotel is usually one who takes it up after failing in other things. The man who funs hotels in South Africa runs them for the bar. “Wanderer,” writing in the “Cape Argus,” said of the hotels in the Western Province that they were not what they ought to be. The food was good enough, but the tea and coffee were bad, and the places were so uncomfortable that one had difficulty in getting sleep. If we are going to get the tourist in South Africa we must get better hotels, and that can be done without liquor. The Minister of Justice says that drunkenness is less now than in the past and is becoming less every year and that there are less people in gaol. In November last, according to the figures, there was a daily average of prisoners in the gaols of 19,129, the daily average for 1923 was 17,820, a daily increase of 1,200 prisoners.

A daily increase?

I mean a yearly increase. Why was it? It was liquor. It is no good saying that the liquor laws are wrong and that they should be altered and reformed. You have had 20 years to do that and the people are tired. The people are now saying that the public want to take a hand. They say we want to have the right to say, if you will not reform the liquor laws then we shall not allow you to sell drink. Let me put it to “the wets.” Would any of them grumble tomorrow if someone came and put a canteen on their farm? Would they stand for a canteen put alongside their farm?

There would not be any control.

Well, would they stand for a canteen if we put a police station alongside it? If we have the right as farmers to keep a canteen off our farms, why should not the people have the right to say that we will not allow you to have bars in our midst. We had prohibition in the Free State. I am old enough to remember when liquor was sold in the country districts of the Free State. And what was the result? When President Brand brought in the Bill crime fell by 85 per cent., in fact it. nearly fell altogether. We ask that we shall be allowed to choose whether we will live in a dry area or a wet area. There is talk of jeopardizing investment and leading to monopoly. There is monopoly to-day in the Cape Peninsula. There is Ohlssons. Out of 165 houses in the Cape Peninsula 105 belong to Ohlssons. But these people will get five or six years in which to put their business in order. The smallness of our towns in South Africa and the distances apart make South Africa a likely place. If this Bill goes through the Free State will go dry. If Stellenbosch wishes to remain wet, why should we be wet? If Stellenbosch wants clubs and railway institutes where they can pour out liquor, it can have them, but don’t force it on the other people. People talk about Scotland and say that local option was a failure there because all Scotland has not gone dry. Really that shows that local option is a success, as the people of Scotland in most cases prefer to keep the liquor shops open. Even Scotland is getting a little dry, although it will take a little time to make the whole of that country dry. Already 400 licences have been cancelled in Scotland. The chief constable of Lerwick reports that as a result of the district going dry there has been a complete collapse of all offences due to drink, while in Wick only one person has been arrested for drunkenness since that place stopped the sale of intoxicating liquor. I challenge anybody to dispute these facts. A few days ago the hon. member for Caledon (Mr. Krige) said: “If you introduce the referendum principle in South Africa it will be most dangerous.” But two nights before he stated: “The best thing done under the Act of Union was to allow Natal to have a referendum to decide whether it should come into the Union.” The hon. member also said: “Look at the burdens on the liquor trade.” But why are there burdens on the liquor trade? Because it is a dangerous trade. The hon. member also stated that if prohibition came into force we should lose two millions in income. But what is the drink traffic costing South Africa? In 1921 the Government made an income of £2,000,000 out of the drink traffic, but it spent on prisons and police courts £4,650,000, of which half is due to drink. Judges and magistrates have frequently stated from the bench in this country, that 50 per cent. to 80 per cent. of crime in South Africa is due to drink. In 1922 the Government spent on mental hospitals, unemployment, customs and excise £1,500,000, of which at least one-fifth was due to drink. So the Government spent £2,500,000 in order to get £2,000,000 back. As a Free Stater I get absolutely ashamed when I walk about Cape Town with my children, who are born in South Africa, and who have to see the sights that I witness. We do not know what a drunken black man is in the Free State, and we have 400,000 blacks in that province. If we saw a drunken black man there we should want to know what was wrong, but on Saturday afternoon you cannot take your children out in Cape Town, because if you did they would see sights that are not to be witnessed in any other port in the world. We have to stop it, and if the Government will not stop it the people will step in and stop it, even although we lose this afternoon. Then the “wets” talk about the Bible. The Chairman of Committees said: “you cannot find anything about local option in the Bible.” But do you find anything about the prohibition of cigarette or opium smoking in the Bible? Of course you don’t. I ask in all seriousness, what would happen if Christ came to Cape Town? Do you think for one moment that He would tolerate what is happening here to-day? If He were here we would have the benefit of His leadership behind local option. If Christ came to Cape Town He would clear Cape Town like he cleared the Temple. It is no argument to say that local option is not mentioned in the Bible, for there is no mention of tea or coffee in the Bible. The only thing in regard to this matter we might find in the Bible is the statement of St. Paul: “If meat makes my brother to stumble, I will eat no more while the world stands.” However, I will not quote the Bible, for I am not a religious man. I am standing on quite another line altogether, and that is the line of saving the children of South Africa. I have nothing against the “wets,” I believe they are just as good and have just as high principles as we have, and that the men who run the hotels are just as good as the men who run the churches. I believe local option would save South Africa. This is going to be a burning question in this country. I am not pledged to local option, but I recognize that there is no question which cuts right through parties like this question does, and it will never become a party question. We know the benefits of liquor control in the Free State. Only in the towns in the Free State can people obtain liquor. You have only to look at the big men from the Free State in this House and you will see the type of man produced there under prohibition in the rural districts.

We have before us two amendments which seem to be in the nature of burking the responsibility of the House coming to a decision on the matter this afternoon. The question has now been debated and written upon for such a long time that we should be in a position to say whether we are, or whether we are not, in favour of the principle of the Bill. I want to make it quite clear that while I favour the principle of local option, I still feel that total prohibition would be a mistake in this country. At the same time I do wholeheartedly support the principle of local option, provided we can get certain provisions embodied in the present Bill. I am not going to weary the House with figures and arguments. We have had it stated in this debate that alcoholic liquor in some form appears to be almost an essential to the human being. Therefore, if the trade therein is to be allowed, let it be carried on openly, and not driven into subterranean channels by total prohibition, but under severe restriction and control. Had the laws which give control of the liquor trade been more strictly enforced; had there been less selfinterest and less vested interest called into play, we would perhaps not to-day have had this question of local option put before us. We in the Cape Province already have a certain measure of local option in our liquor laws, but there are difficulties in the way of the exercise of that option, mainly owing to the difficulty of obtaining the requisite signatures to the memorial required. I have spoken to the introducer of this Bill and I endeavoured to get embodied in it certain principles which, I think, should be provided for. Before I came to this House I did not quite know the procedure necessary, but I can see now that we must vote on the principle involved, “yes” or “no.” But when it comes on at a later stage, should the second reading be passed, when the matter is referred to Select Committee, as the mover has promised it shall be, I then mean to claim that various questions shall be dealt with in an adequate and proper manner. I am not satisfied that on the broad principles, the extremely important issues, both economic and social, involved in this measure, a bare majority of the people in the area concerned is sufficient to decide for or against a certain line of action. I think that in clause 4 (2) there should be an adequate majority provided for in proportion to the importance of the issue placed before the electors. I feel that if there is a “no change” vote, then, perhaps, as it is leaving things in statu quo, a “bare” majority would be sufficient; but when it comes to “reduction” of licences, I hold that the majority should be one of 55—45. When it comes to a question of “no licence” whatever, which means total prohibition in that area, with the possibility of its spreading to other parts of the same country, I feel that the majority should be somewhere in the neighbourhood of 60—40, but, in view of the fact that a referendum can be taken every three years, and that it might take longer, but that the people aiming at total prohibition would reach their goal through the 55—45 majority. I am prepared to accept that as the minimum majority for a “no licence” vote, too. I must congratulate the hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow) on the reasoned and sensible speech which he has contributed to this debate, and in which the question was dealt with, as it deserves to be, as one of the most serious questions before the country. Feeling, as I do, I claim that adequate majorities should be provided for. They are not so provided for in the Bill as it stands, and, had they been so provided for, I think it would have disarmed some of the criticism which has been offered. I stand here as a man who has no wish to see the rights of any individual in this country interfered with unless there is good and sound reason therefor, and, if they should be interfered with without good and sound reason, he should have an opportunity of having that decision put to the test of an appeal to a competent tribunal. In clause 5 (5) it is stated that there shall be no appeal against the decision of a licensing court. Let us take a hypothetical case of four licences in one area. We have a referendum of the people which has been claimed on the conditions laid down here. The voting will be by ballot, I am glad to see, instead of the signing of a memorial. It is true that in our Cape Liquor Laws we have local option already in the form of an appeal by the people by way of memorial, but we know what too often happens when people go round to get signatures to a memorial. We know the influences that can be brought to bear, sinister influences, to induce men to depart from the principles that they probably hold, but under this Bill there will be the safeguard of a ballot. I am not sure whether 10 per cent. asking for the ballot is sufficient. However, we will take the four licences. Four men are running their public houses, or whatever they are, on an absolutely straight basis, decent publicans without any convictions or complaints against them four hypothetically perfect publicans. When it comes to a vote that there shall be a reduction of at least 25 per cent. of licences, that means that one of those four men has to have his licence taken away. The promoters of this Bill say that the licence shall be taken away by the licensing court and that there shall be no appeal against the decision of the court. I wish to cast no criticism against the constitution of our licensing courts, but I am not satisfied that that is a tribunal to which an issue of that sort should be left for final decision. How are they going to choose which of those four men should go, all of whom are equally entitled to claim continuance of their licences? I say it is within our capability to devise some means by which an appeal from such a decision can be made. I do not for one moment wish to suggest that there should be a right of appeal against a vote taken by this ballot, but I do hold that, where a man is forfeiting his livelihood, where he has to give up his livelihood probably after a licence has been carried on for generations by him and his ancestors, where that course is taken without any fault on the man’s own part, there should be some way of appealing against that decision. No less an authority than one of the most respected judges on our Bench, a man who proved his fearless integrity in the early days in the Transvaal, Sir John Kotze, has stated—

If it is not possible to provide for appeal to an absolutely impartial tribunal, then, in view of the importance of the issue, and the fact that every thinking man wishes to abolish this abuse of liquor, we ought to go back to the community concerned and say: Seeing that you have decided that one or other of these licences shall go, which do you say shall go and which remain? I mean to fight for some form of appeal in the case of men to whom there is not objection. Where there is anything against a man or his licence premises the matter can be decided without all that trouble. It has been stated that if compensation is insisted upon, that wrecks this Bill. One could show quite clearly, if one took the time, that injustice can be done by this Bill as it stands. Should a man’s licence be forfeited by reason of misdemeanour, I say he has no right to compensation. But where the man is losing his livelihood through no fault on his part, but at the will of the local community, and possibly reaching the state where he cannot enter any other business or profession, I maintain that he has a just claim for compensation. I maintain that there are a large number of publicans and hotel keepers who have made if their life business to carry on this trade, and are carrying it on with credit and honour. Should a man have his licence taken away without any real cause of forfeiture except the will of the people, some form of compensation should be provided. We have heard the amount of revenue derived by the state from this trade. Surely it could be provided that a certain amount of that money should be earmarked to pay compensation or, failing that, the Legislature could provide that the trade itself should devise some scheme of trade insurance for the provision of compensation? I say, without fear of contradiction, that the question of drunkenness in this country is treated far too lightly, and there is not sufficient shame attached to the fact of a man being a drunkard, especially in certain areas and amongst a certain section of the community. However, whether the drunkenness be caused by the rum of Natal, or the spirit brought into, or made, in the Transvaal, or bad brandy and wine made in the Western Province, let us not throw stones at any particular areas, but all combine to fight against the abuse of liquor. We ought to strengthen and put our liquor laws strictly into force and, if we did, the disgusting scenes one witnesses would not be tolerated for a month. I hope due cognisanse will be taken of the fact that the liquor laws are not sufficiently enforced. Whatever the causes of drunkenness, we should control this evil before it gets beyond our control. I do not have any fear that local option fairly carried out and administered is going to have any serious effect on the wine farmers. I think if the wine farmers went in more generally for quality and not quantity, their industry would benefit, and I claim their more active aid in fighting the evil of the abuse of their products. And so I would urge upon the wine farmers not to allow their wine to be adulterated, as is very largely done at present. The fault occurs not on the farms, but when sold to the consumers. We know of the smuggling of liquor going on the borders of the native territories. It is a solid fact that there are strings of smuggling bands working liquor into the native areas. Let us control that; let us see that the liquor sold is only good liquor, and let us administer our liquor laws fearlessly. Then, if we have the promise measure of the Liquor Control Bill licked into shape so as to provide for the effective handling of liquor and the liquor trade, local option will be used mainly to reduce the facilities for getting drink. But I believe that the days of total prohibition are very far distant, and I for one will be very sorry to see it come about, because it means driving the evil of the abuse of liquor below the surface.

As members know, very great pressure is being brought to bear upon us, especially us younger members, in regard to the liquor question. It is not a party measure, and for that reason we on the back benches are enjoying the happy experience of being left to our own devices and allowed to follow our own line. This pressure comes from both sides—from the very well-meaning people who think they can make the world sober by legislation, and most of whom seem to live in my constituency—and from the liquor trade. I am not speaking about the producers of liquor, but about the dealers, because their point of view is pure selfinterest and nothing else. I am convinced that the profits in the liquor trade are out of all proportion to the services which it renders, and I have tried my best to increase the taxation upon the liquor business in the Transvaal. Unfortunately, I could not get any support amongst the three parties in the Transvaal Provincial Council, they all admitted that the trade would stand more taxation—even double the present taxation but they said, “We had better not do it. If the supporters of this Bill were to start an agitation for a State monopoly of the liquor trade I would be with them. I recognize the good and noble motives of the supporters of this Bill, but their motives are so good and noble that they lose sight of the fact, which has been proved—over and over again, and is to-day being proved—in America, that you cannot make men moral or sober by punishing them. We know what is happening in America. The hon. member for Piquetberg (Mr. de Waal) has given us some figures. Any man in America can get as much liquor as he likes, but he has to pay more, and it may be poisonous stuff. We know also that the gaols are full and that bribery and corruption are on the increase in America. I believe that the man who does not take liquor in America to-day does so for other reasons than because he is prohibited. When I was in New York, before prohibition was introduced, I was struck very forcibly by the very small amount of liquor that was used. I am surprised that some of the liquor trade’s money has not been spent in promoting the prohibition movement, because under prohibition they would be able to sell still worse liquor, at still more prohibitive prices, and be able, in addition, to take part in the new American sport of breaking the law. I admire the motives of the supporters of this Bill, but they are not practical, and some of them are not even consistent. They want to force people, other people, to leave off drinking.

Not in this Bill.

That is the ultimate aim. If it is so essential for human beings to leave off drinking, why don’t they leave off drinking themselves? I am as much opposed to insobriety as any of the supporters of this Bill. They say this Bill is the first step in the direction of total prohibition. It is not the first step. The first step is much nearer home. Right at the front door. The first step is to stop drinking themselves. Let them take this step and then a few more steps to prove that they have stopped drinking, then let them bring forward this Bill. I do not want to say anything about their coming to this House with clean hands, but I think we are entitled to expect that a Bill like this should be brought forward on steady feet. Why don’t they set the example? Why don’t they prove how much healthier and happier they are?

Do you suggest I have not got steady feet?

I am not talking about you, but about some of your supporters. I am not referring either to the hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow). A very little example is worth a lot of the eloquence we have heard this afternoon. One member who has spoken in support of this Bill spoke of whisky he had drunk, and his complaint was that it was unpleasant whisky.

Cannot a man be a local optionist without his being a prohibitionist?

Not if he is a logical man.

I took part in the absurdity of arguing prohibition with a very strong supporter of this Bill after he had had two drinks. No! he had had four, and I had had only one. As he had had these four drinks, I was not so foolish as to suggest to him that he should become a teetotaller at once, but I asked him whether, if prohibition were to come to South Africa, he would leave off drinking, or, if not, what he was going to do about it, and he got quite indignant. Why should I, he said? We will always be able to get liquor, and by that he meant that he and I and other people who helped in a small way to make laws would always be able to get liquor. Is it not an absurdity to make laws and not intend to carry them out yourself? The man in the street is entitled to laugh at legislators who do this. What he probably will do is to laugh with them over a couple of drinks. If we apply this test, that no hon. member should vote for the Bill unless he himself is a total abstainer, I do not think they will get ten votes for the Bill. I notice that quite a number of the strong supporters of this Bill and a number of members who spoke for this Bill are not in their seats. I do not know where they have gone to. It is not impossible that they have gone to have a drink, and I must admit that it is dry and thirsty work listening to this debate on the Liquor Option Bill. I do not know much yet about Parliamentary procedure. I do not know whether I would be in order to propose an amendment at this stage, but if it becomes necessary later on—I do not think it will become necessary—I am going to propose an amendment to the effect that no hon. member who votes for the Bill shall in future be allowed in the bar. Joking aside, I call on all hon. members who are going to vote for the Bill to pledge themselves to become total abstainers, and if I succeed in this very reasonable request I believe honestly that I shall have done more for the cause of temperance than the hon. member who introduced the Bill has done so far. Speaking for myself, as I have no intention of becoming a total abstainer and as I wish to be as logical and consistent as possible, I am going to vote against the second reading of this Bill. One of the arguments which I rather felt was that this Bill is such a very democratic measure. I man can vote as he likes. He can vote to have no licences to have less licences, and to keep the existing licences; but they very carefully refrain from allowing this free voter to vote for more licences. If they were to put that in the Bill so that this man who is so democratic and free could vote to double the licences in his municipality, that would be more democratic, but I am afraid there would be a large number of free drinks going about.

I had not intended to speak, but I am so very rarely in accord with the hon. member for Johannesburg (North East Rand), that I feel it would be a pity to disobey the biblical injunction to let brotherly love continue. Like him, I too have been inundated with telegrams from well-meaning people who are perfectly sincere, but like all those hon. members who are going to vote against this Bill, we often find ourselves in a somewhat invidious position in regard to a Bill of this sort. We are told, you are encouraging drunkenness and debauchery; you are imperilling the youth of the country, sapping the efficiency of the country, and so on. None of us like to be told that. None of us would hesitate to vote for the Bill if we thought it was going to put a stop to drunkenness and debauchery. No, in spite of these things, I am going to vote against the Bill, because I think it is freak legislation, and I do not think it will defeat its own object. If the Bill goes through as it stands, we will have an increased form of that type of lawlessness which is doing so much harm in America. America has gone completely dry, and it must be far easier to control liquor in a country that is completely dry. But this Bill contemplates turning this country into a piebald country, a check-board of wet and dry areas. The inevitable result will be that we will have to have cordons of police and detectives round every dry area. If America is finding so much trouble, how much more would we have?

America started with local option.

I do not think prohibition is a success in America from what we hear of it. I hold that the question of immoderate drinking is solving itself. If we cast our minds back fifteen years, I remember at 11 a.m. you would see every lawyer and business man streaming down to the bars to have a drink. To-day they go to the tearooms. We are not a drunken people. I agree with what the hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow) said about the Free State, and I do not think this Bill is necessary. It is quite true there is a lot of drunkenness among the coloured population of the Western Province. It is a canker which should be cut out. But the remedy should lie along the line of special legislation. I do not see why this type of Bill should be introduced to cure an evil of that sort. I do not think that the Bill is called for. If the evil of drunkenness were a great national danger in South Africa at the present moment, I might say otherwise. I am probably acquainted with as many Europeans in South Africa as most people, and if I recall my personal acquaintances, I do not think I know two drunkards in the Union. I think far more families are ruined by gambling, horse-racing and so on, than by drunkenness. I honestly do not believe that drunkenness is a national evil in this country to-day, and I sincerely hope that the Bill will not go through.

There is hopeless confusion with reference to the tendency of this Bill and the opponents of the Bill maintain that if it goes through we shall then necessarily have total prohibition and that this local option is actually total prohibition in the bud. But there is still a great gulf between local option and total prohibition. I should not like to allege that the one flows out of the other. There was total prohibition in Russia during the world war without local option having preceded it. In any country an election plank can be made of it and the electors, by the men whom they send to Parliament, secure a majority in favour of the measure. There is, e.g., Scotland, which has had local option a long time. It remains there and goes no further, and in a country like Sweden there are now many stricter laws with reference to drink than there would be if local option existed there, and they work well. I think that we must separate these two things. If total prohibition can come in this country, then it is a good thing. It will certainly be a good thing, but if we cannot get that length, then local option will surely assist in bringing about a better regulation of the drink traffic. Look what has happened. When local option was in the air, farmers, especially wine farmers, met together and said: “We must take steps to manage things properly, otherwise we shall have total prohibition.” Last year a successful congress in the circumstances was held at the Paarl, and I think that it had good results, then local option was in the air. If local option now is adopted and stands on its legs, we shall have the result that the wine farmers and all sections of the population would stand together, and that the wine farmers would say: “Let us take care that this child, local option, does not grow up into total prohibition; let us try to rear the child in such a way that we get such a regulation of the drink traffic that the public will not insist on total prohibition. I think that is amply sufficient reason for voting for local option. It is quite certain that a change is necessary. If we think of the canteen system, especially in the Cape Province, then we feel it. If a man travels in the Western Province, especially at week-ends and sees what is going on, and you see how the canteen is nothing else than a place of disposal of the worst and commonest kind of drink, that the canteen is the source of the greatest misery not only to the coloured man, but just as well for the white man, then we feel we cannot allow things go on as they are.

When will we stop it?

When the public stand together, and the wine farmers help in the direction that was taken last year when the congress sat at the Paarl. A wine farmer has told me that if the canteen is abolished so that the cheap wine can no longer be sold, then wine farming will go to the dogs. But is there any one in the world who wants to make money from another’s blood. Must the public not step in? If we get the co-operation of all sections of the community to see to it that the inferior quality of drink is not brought into the trade, that the disposal of the common kind of drink, especially in the Western Province, stops, then we shall be much further advanced. This is what local option aims at. The natives and coloured people in the Western Province get a double supply of drink to-day. First from their master and then at the end of the week from the canteen, and the wife gets nothing of her husband’s wages. That is sufficient reason for the adoption of local option in order to get our wine farmers to co-operate more than ever.

It can be attained by the liquor laws.

With local option, we are, I think, going to get co-operation of all portions of the population in connection with this matter. If the wine farmers do not co-operate nothing will be effected. Then there is another point. One travels in Europe, on the continent where the bar system does not exist as with us and in England, and we see much less drunkenness. Light, healthy drink is sold in the restaurants, and drunkenness is less there than in other places. Why can we not by co-operation get that state of affairs in our own country?

That will not be got by local option.

I now come to local option. If we get local option they will be afraid of total prohibition and we shall get the co-operation of the wine farmers which we have not had hitherto. Now another matter. To-day nine-tenths of church people are in favour of total prohibition. They are earnestly praying for it. What are the church people aiming at? Are they a collection of fanatics who wish to force this matter on to the country? Has the church then not been a mighty factor in our education system? Has not the church brought about many social reforms? Don’t the people intend to build up the country? And many of our best church people are found among the wine farmers. But the wine farmer will not come to grief. Even with total prohibition the wine farmer will not be injured. The church asks the help of Parliament in this matter. I say that nine-tenths of the church people, your Dutch and English and Roman churches in the country, are all pressing for a change. Shall we not then be doing right if we give this thing a chance? The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. Conradie) has said here this afternoon that this thing has not been tried yet and that we therefore do not know what the consequences will be, that we do not know whether it will answer the purpose. Let us make a trial. The church people know what is going on in the back portions of the country because they come into contact with all classes of the population. They support the proposal because local option will help us to lessen the unfortunate conditions due to the drink traffic. There is another side to the matter. It will be the first step to getting uniformity in the liquor laws of the country. Now we have different laws in the Cape Province, the Transvaal and the Free State. And what a difference does there not exist! What is permitted here is punished in the Transvaal by six months, and where the wine farmer here can sell his drink where he likes, in the Transvaal there are limits. If one goes from the one territory to the other different conditions prevail. This Bill brings about uniformity which will be a blessing to the Union. For this reason also we should give local option a chance to show what can be done for the betterment of the terrible conditions in our country.

If one listens to the hon. member for Potchefstroom (Rev. Mr. Fick) one would almost say that we had an opponent of local option were it not that at the end of his speech he asked our co-operation to get the Bill passed. I have here a telegram on behalf of 285,000 members of the Wesleyan Church, asking me to vote for the Bill. I belong to the Dutch Reformed Church and I represent five complete congregations and two half congregations. I have, however, not received a telegram from those congregations, and it therefore appears that all the churches are not in favour of the Bill, or at any rate I am led to think that the portion which I represent is not for it. But when such urgent telegrams come to me then it is necessary for me to consider the matter that is called local option by those people. The word is very innocent, but we find that a great deal is meant by it. I do not wish to give it another name except that it is the mantle under which the ghost of prohibition stalks. With reference to the quotations which have been made here, I want to say that out of the 70,000 cases there were in 1922 in the United States, 37,000 were in connection with prohibition. If the position is so where the law is in full operation, then can we expect that it will be a success with us? I have listened to the debate with interest, and although I represent a wine district, I would vote for the measure, even against my electors ’wishes, if I were convinced that it will decrease drunkenness. The Bill provides that certain licensed houses shall be closed but that others shall remain open. The drinker will therefore have the opportunity of getting drink, but not alone this, the opportunity is also created for the development of a population of smugglers of which we shall have to reap the bitter fruit. The law of nature can never cheat us. A man is so constituted that he wants things that he ought not to have. It runs through our whole nature, the forbidden fruit is the sweetest. The man who is accustomed to three little glasses of wine per day at fixed intervals and who comes into a dry area where he cannot get it at fixed times, will at night go to wet areas and there he will meet his friends who have the same habits as himself. There the three glasses will be consumed at once. The person gets drunk and the greatest quarrel takes place there to the detriment of wife and children. Hon. members know that local option will bring conditions into the country that will be intolerable. They, however, want prohibition, why then cannot they come out openly with it? Why do not they make such a proposal? No, as the hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow) has said, they want that to come gradually. Why then threaten the Western Province and undermine its interests? But the supporters of the Bill know well that the time for total prohibition is not yet ripe. Therefore they come again with democracy and base the Bill thereon, but when the Bill has once been adopted and an intolerable condition has come about in the country then they will come with a demand for prohibition. They let the cat out of the bag at Cradock. There they stated: “We want a bone dry State.” Now I ask, why there should be continual nagging at the produce of the wine farmer. Have we not just introduced legislation for the better control of the drink traffic? And members are here again with local option. Must the wine farmer live then constantly in uncertainty? The member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow) has referred proudly to the Free State. Where do they come from? Are they not descendants of the Huguenots who lived in the Western Province and who introduced vines into the country and propagated religion and civilization? I make an appeal to the descendants of the Huguenots to assist that this Bill is not forced upon a portion of the population, but that we will by mutual co-operation save a section of our farmers. As the hon. member for Piquetberg (Mr. de Waal) has said, the wine farmer, the grain farmer and the cattle farmer are three inseparable links. Where one is injured, all three suffer. I therefore wish to appeal to members to kill this Bill so that we can be quit of it.

I am always afraid to speak about this matter in Parliament when it comes up, because I am anxious that we should come to the vote so that we shall know where we stand. I therefore will not detain the House long, but I cannot neglect a few words with reference to the speech of the hon. member for Ladysmith (Mr. J. J. M. van Zyl). He has told the House that he got a telegram from the Wesleyan Church representing 385,000 members. Well, I also got such a telegram. He has said that he represents five congregations of the Dutch Reformed Church, but that they have said nothing. I will tell the hon. member that I also received a telegram from the synod Committee of the Transvaal churches which represent about 130,000 members, by which I am asked unanimously to support local option. I say it is a very important matter. Amongst the wine farmers of the Western Province I have some of my best friends, and I have near relations who are wine farmers, but I represent a constituency which by a large majority has asked me to vote for local option, and I am going to vote for it. In the Transvaal we have taken the bull by the horns, and in 1896-’97 we went further than local option. Then we got rid of the outside canteens in the country districts. The Free State has also done this. If ever the Transvaal took the right step then it was in releasing the people from the canteens in the outside areas. And if the Free State ever did a noble deed—and the Free State is always honoured for its laws—then it was that they abolished the outside canteens. I am not fighting for the first time to-day for local option. We have been trying for 30 years to get it. In the Transvaal we also heard much about compensation then, and even if we have to give compensation to people who have been the losers by the abolition of the canteen system. Much has been said here about the extermination of the wine industry. I deeply feel on the matter, but, on the other hand, hon. members must not take it amiss of us if we, as Transvaal representatives, look after the interests of our electors, and if there ever was a matter which comes from the people and which they will continue to ask for, then it is an improvement in connection with the drink question. Why we have not succeeded hitherto is because we have never had a Government who has been sympathetic in the matter. I thought we now had a Government that would help us, but the hon. the Prime Minister, I am surprised at it, has spoken against it, while the people are plainly asking for something of the sort. We shall have to reach a solution some day. The hon. the Prime Minister has said that we have not a big fleet to fight against smuggling. I did not know that our Government were so weak that they cannot keep a few smugglers in check. But I do not wish to speak any further, for we must come to a vote. If the majority is against it, then we shall return next year. I only wish to add this, that I thought that the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. Conradie) came to Parliament to help us to obtain local option. From his speech it appears that he has already once been converted. I hope he will be converted again before he votes. We feel for our brothers in the Cape Province, but hon. members from the Cape Province must help us to get rid of smuggling which now takes place in the Transvaal. We represent a good portion of the public and the church is at the back of us. I am a churchman, and I am not ashamed to say it, and I am thankful that the church supports this matter. I can give the Government and hon. members the assurance that if we lose this afternoon that we shall come again and keep on with this matter.

I can agree fully with a great deal which has been said by the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys). I must say that the church has been using its influence very greatly upon hon. members. Every member of Parliament has received a telegram to support the Bill. I do not wish to defend or to oppose the Bill. But if we consider what goes on in other countries, then we should stand still and think if the time has come for us to accept such a Bill in this country. I think that the law which was introduced into America was total prohibition of the drink traffic, and it is untimely to introduce legislation here such as that which we now have before us. When the time is ripe therefor let the Government introduce a measure for total prohibition. I go still further, and say that kaffir beer also should be forbidden by it. If this Bill is adopted, I am certain that the Government will be pestered to make provision for services for which there is to-day no provision on the Estimates. If an area is made dry, the people will soon come to the Government for more police, and this will be a great burden on the Government. It will be expected of the Government to keep that area dry. The boundaries will have to be guarded, and we shall there again have the evil of the trapping system. How many thousands of people will then not have to go to gaol? I do not wish to detain the House, but I do not see my way to vote for the Bill, because I think that it will cause far more difficulties than we have now. If something like it has to come, then the Government can fix a certain period for the farmers to alter their method of farming. I take it that the farmers will then be prepared to do so, but we dare not to-day destroy an industry by a word while we encouraged and protected it. We dare not drive the farmers into the greatest of difficulties. The Bill which is introduced here every year means that the work and industry of the farmer will be injured. It becomes numb. A sword is always hanging over its head. Let us make an end of it by a law introduced by the Government. But do not let us come forward every year with this measure.

I Want to say one word on the question of compensation. The hon. member who introduced this Bill said that the people in the liquor trade had neither a legal nor a moral right to compensation. I should not like to argue on the legal right, but one’s attitude on the moral right depends on how you regard this trade. For those like the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell), who regards the trade as a source of evil, their attitude is to be understood, but if, as I do, you regard those in the liquor trade as honest citizens carrying on an honest means of livelihood, you must hold that they have every right to compensation if that means of livelihood is taken away. In this Bill it is laid down that it shall apply to areas in big towns. Are you going to adopt a system in which the whole of the licences on one side of the street are to be abolished and the licensees ruined, while those on the other side of the street do double the business, without affecting the total amount of liquor sold? If so, we are not meting out the justice which is the right of every citizen. This Bill provides for the reduction of licences. In our country towns we have three or four licences, conducted by men who are carrying on a perfectly legitimate business. A reduction of licences would mean that one of these men would be ruined without reducing the amount of drunkenness in that town, and yet you refuse him compensation. One hon. member referred to this Bill as an experiment and used the words: “If it worked satisfactorily.” Those words are to my mind the greatest argument in favour of compensation. Are hundreds of men to be ruined on the wine farms and in the licensed houses for it to be found eventually that the application of the Bill is a failure? That would be an absolute injustice. I thoroughly agree with those who advocate steps to minimize the evils of drink, and if the supporters of this Bill will include a compensation clause I shall give it my very hearty support and vote for it; otherwise I shall have to vote against it.

It is obviously the wish of the House to come to a vote at once, and therefore I shall not be more than one minute in replying. I think the House has had a full discussion, but I wish to indicate my attitude in regard to the two amendments which have been moved. I should have liked to reply in some detail to the speeches made against the Bill, but I feel I would be meeting the wishes of the House to omit that, but I hope it will not be taken by opponents as a sign of weakness.

Not at all.

My foregoing the right of replying is not to be taken as a sign of weakness. My attitude towards the two amendments is: One amendment was to discharge the motion for second reading and send the subject matter of the Bill to a Select Committee. That at least had some measure of fairness about it, because it could then be said, we will examine the merits of the proposal. But this afternoon another amendment has been proposed to the effect that the Bill be read this day six months, which means that this House, if it accepts the amendment, will have nothing to do with the Bill with or without the modifications proposed. Of course, I am against the second amendment, and I am also against the first amendment, because I am asking the House to accept the principle, and it has my assurance that if the second reading is passed, I will move that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee. I hope the House will realize that this is a straight vote on the principle of local option, and that those who vote against the second reading are voting against that principle.

I proceed to put the question. Two amendments have been moved, one by the hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie)—

The second amendment, which was proposed by the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. Conradie)—