From ‘The Racing Problem’, The Spectator, 20 March 1915:
We are not temperance fanatics. We do not suggest the prohibition of the public sate of intoxicants in order to penalize any one or to punish people for having sold alcohol in the past. We do not regard either the sale or the consumption of alcohol as a crime. A moderate consumption of alcohol does no more harm either morally or physically than a moderate indulgence in other unnecessary luxuries like smoking. We know, too, that a permanent temperance, a temperance worth having, can only come by a change in national habits—through freedom, not through interference with liberty. What we are asking for is merely war prohibition in order to produce national efficiency at the moment. After the war is over if people desire to use intoxicants they must be allowed to do so.
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