548 JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS [Feb. 27,

the law by reason of the reward to the informer had brought
into existence. A man of high tone and lofty honor would
scorn to appear on the witness stand against a fellow citizen
as informer; a citizen who had been licensed during the week to
follow a legitimate calling, but who, because he had yielded to
the importunities of a friend or customer, and thereby ren-
dered himself liable to the penalties of the law of 1847, and
the different supplements thereto, each more stringent in
their character, until they all culminated in the law of 1866,
enacted by a Legislature that neither reflected the number
or political sentiment of our State. It is the puritanical,
stringent and draconic features of this law we propose to
change. Men can no more be restrained from violating law
by penal statutes than made moral or good men by tempta-
tion held out to perjury, which the law of 1866 does offer. If
the moral sense of the community is not sufficient to discoun-
tenance vice, it is vain for the moralist to invoke the aid of
the Legislaure. We do not believe that a single citizen has
been saved from the evils of intemperance, or his moral posi-
tion improved by the enactment of the different laws, which
we propose to modify.

Tacitus, in his glowing periods, utters this sentiment: "We
strive after things forbidden, and covet things denied." He
knew the inutility of legislating about morals.

A man addicted to the daily use of spirituous liquors, be
he high or low in the social scale, that man will have the
coveted stimulant despite any law which the Legislature may
enact. The man of wealth will always be supplied with "the
forbidden fruit;" he will have around him at the well-spread
Sunday board, groaning with all the appliances that can
stimulate appetite, the man of pleasure, the man of social
talent, to enliven the dullness of the circle by a genius stimu-
lated, and which derives its brightness from the grape. The
poor laboring man, too, will provide himself with "the for-
bidden fruit" on Saturday night, less expensive than the rich
man, but which will enable him to purchase a momentary
oblivion from the thousand and one troubles to which, his life
is incident. Think you not any man addicted to the habit-
ual use of ardent spirits has not his periods of melancholy
thought and remorse ? If those moments of bitter reflection
will not induce him to abstain, then the work of the legis-
lator is in vain. It possesses no more value, no more ef-
ficiency, than the paper on which it is written.

For these reasons we propose a modification of the Sunday
Law, and respectfully report the following bill.

WILLIAM DEVECMON.

Which was read.