The Times

LIQUOR'S GRASP ON FRANCE

The Greatest Social Evil Facing the Excitable Republic.

(From the Pall Mall Gazette)

Two independent attempts have been made almost simultaneously to grapple in some slight degree with the drink problem which has developed of late years into one of the most serious social evils with which France is faced. During the past quarter of a century the habits of the country in the matter of drink have been entirely transformed and transformed for the worse, in a way that would scarcely be credited but for the evidence furnished by statistics. A comparatively sober country not long ago, France has become the prey of the cheapest and most deleterious forms of alcohol, to the ruin of public health and the detriment of the national prosperity.

It is no exaggeration to say that the authorities are appalled by the progress made by the scourge. Everybody is agreed that remedial measures are indispensable but the problem is so complex and so many vested interests are at stake that little or nothing has been accomplished as yet in the way of preventive legislation.

Indeed the drink question is responsible for a very significant example of the legislative sterility of the French Parliament. For nobody knows how many sessions past a bill dealing with the sale and manufacture of alcoholic drinks has been bandied about between the chamber and the Senate. The producers of intoxicating poisons have played off one assembly against the other, and the measure being

non-political this game of battledore and shuttlecock is likely to continue to the end of time.

In the meanwhile private initiative is doing something. As I have said, two cases in point have just been furnished, one by a civil, the other by a military authority. The prefect of the Meurthe and Moselle has hit on the idea of placarding every town, village and commune in his district with warning bills which call the attention of the inhabitants to the disastrous consequences of indulgence in strong drink. The prefect points out that between 1880 and 1898 the consumption of pure alcohol in his department alone has increased from 12,000 to 20,000 hectolitres. He adds the fact, which speaks for itself, that at the present day one of every nine Frenchmen is the victim of the alcohol plague.