License Commissioners of that city, made February 1st, 1877: "It must be
admitted that the business of liquor-selling in this city is, to a very
large extent, in the hands of _irresponsible men and women_, whose idea
of a license law ends with the simple matter of paying a certain sum,
the amount making but little difference to them, _provided they are left
to do as they please after payment_. Besides the saloons and bar-rooms,
which are open publicly, the traffic in small grocery stores, in cellars
and in dwelling-houses, in some parts of the city, _is almost
astounding. The Sunday trade is enormous, and it seems as if there were
not hours enough in the whole round of twenty-four, or days enough in
the entire week to satisfy the dealers_."

The experience of Massachusetts is, as we have already said, the
experience of every community, State or nation in which an effort has
been made to abridge the evils of intemperance by licensing the
dram-shop.

And to whom and to what class of citizens does the State accord, under
license, the privilege of making gain out of the people's loss? For
whom is every interest in the nation taxed and every industry hurt? For
whom are the houses of the poor made poorer; and the supply of bread
diminished? For whom are a crime-assaulted and pauper-ridden people
driven to build jails and poor-houses, and insane asylums, and maintain
courts and juries and a vast army of police, at the cost of millions of
dollars every year?

For great benefactors to whom the nation owes a debt of gratitude? For
men who are engaged in great industrial or commercial enterprises?
Promoters of education? leaders in the great march of civilization? Even
if this were so, better not to have accepted the service than pay for it