DRYING UP THE OCEAN
There is a little town in Wyoming which, outwardly, is as arid as that
waste of desert not so many hundreds of miles away from it. Yet for
a consideration one may obtain all the moonshine and gin one desires
at another village near by. The lady prohibitionists, all members of
the W. C. T. U., as they pass the erstwhile village drunkard (on their
way to some sanctimonious meeting), remark what a wonderful thing the
cleaning up of the town has been. Poor devil! only a little while ago
he was literally in the gutter. Now, look at him, as he sits in the
merry sunshine on the porch of the post-office, whittling his life
away, where aforetime he drank it away. (They do not know that the poor
devil is about the only person in the village--except themselves--who
fails to obtain whiskey, though his reasons for the lack are hardly
similar to theirs. He simply cannot afford the price.) It costs a few
pennies to get to that neighboring wet village; and, after one is
there, it costs a little more to procure the stuff he once drank with
such avidity. But the flappers--oh, yes, they have them even in Wyoming
small towns!--and the boys who are their friends, can dash over in a
Ford and get all they want. Concealed on the hip, they feel no lack of
stimulation when the evening shadows fall. They do not get tight in
public, as the town drunkard used to do--not at all. But they are up
to all the tricks of sly drinking. If they were burglars, they would
be called sneak-thieves. America has taught them a thing or two; and
where the previous generation, at their age, never dreamed of taking
a cocktail, they think of nothing else, and will get it at any price.
This is true the country over. But the obviously enforced reformation
of many a village souse is pointed to as perfect evidence that all is
well. I suppose those virtuous W. C. T. U. ladies go to bed o’ nights
and sleep serenely, happy in the consciousness that they have helped
the race. And even as they slumber, hip-flasks are opened, corks are
popping, and an enjoyable time is being had by all.
Thus do reformers blind themselves to conditions as they are. The
village drunkard, tottering to his grave, has been reformed--if he was
worth reforming at all--while the arriving host of youth is dancing and
singing and jazzing its way “down the primrose path to the everlasting
bonfire.”
This is but another evidence of our national hypocrisy. And not content
with making the land dry--which we haven’t done at all--we must go
out and make the sea dry. Our holier-than-thou attitude has caused us
to lose our sense of humor, verily; for to dry up the ocean is going
Moses and the children of Israel one better. Moreover, the day of
miracles is past.
It was in the early Fall of 1922 that we suddenly discovered that our
ships were a part of sacred American soil. International law had long
since told us so, but somehow, in the confusion following the passage
of Mr. Volstead’s vaudeville act, we had forgotten it. Perhaps we were
too busy, like the Wyoming ladies, trying to make our citizens good on
shore to get around to those sensible enough to leave the country for
an ocean voyage. That is the American way.
At any rate, our boats continued, under Mr. Lasker, to be pleasant
oases on the desert of the sea; and fortunate indeed were those
who lived along the coast and could jump aboard if things became
unbearable at home--which they hadn’t. Yet it was good to know that
there the ships lay in harbor, ready for each and all of us, stocked
with pleasant and rare vintages. Again the rich were in luck. If one’s
pocketbook were fat enough, one could obtain anything one desired. God
pity the poor workingman, but life was life, and there were plenty
of luxuries which had always been denied the impoverished, but which
the wealthy took as a part of the strange scheme of things, and oh,
yes, it was awfully unfair, but that was that, and after all what was
one to do about it, and it was too bad, and oh, dear, and oh, my, and
goodness gracious and a lot of other stuff which I have overheard but
mercifully forgotten.
It took us two and a half years to discover in one minute that Uncle
Sam himself had been a bootlegger at sea. A long, long time to have
had our own eyes sealed! But when Attorney General Daugherty finally
issued his decision that American boats must be dry, all sorts of
complications arose. We told foreign governments that their ships, too,
must not enter our ports with liquor aboard. All the ocean, within the
three-mile limit prescribed by international law, was to cease to be
wet. It mattered not that Italian sailors were supplied with red wine
as part of their fare; they must throw it overboard before they came
into our sanctified precincts. And even if foreign bars were sealed and
padlocked and double-padlocked, they would be anathema to us. Whether
the liquor brought over on them was intended to be sold here, or merely
kept on board for the return voyage, mattered not. We were going to put
a stop to rum-running, and now, Mr. Foreigner, what are you going to do
about it?
As this is written, England has already protested against such drastic
and high-handed action. One of the British ships has been seized, and
a test case is to be made of her seizure. We, who held aloof so long
from all sorts of entangling alliances; we who preached the doctrine of
staying at home and minding our own business, suddenly find ourselves
rushing in where angels fear to tread; and, losing our humor, we may
likewise lose our friends.
The powerful Anti-Saloon League is responsible for our foolhardiness.
We will ruin American shipping, we will commit maritime harikari; but
it is all right, since, having slipped our heads into the noose of
the fanatics, what difference does it make how soon or how slowly we
strangle to death?
Of course there will be all sorts of confusion, all kinds of delays
in the courts--for naturally other nations will make test cases, and
it will be many months--perhaps years--before America knows how she
stands with Europeans and how Europeans stand with her. It is one thing
to manage our own citizens--quite another to guide the conduct of our
neighbors.
It is curious how ships and shipping enter into our governmental
affairs again--how history repeats itself. Deny it though we will, we
got into the World War only after our shipping had been interfered
with. We accepted German insults and taunts; but the moment our
business interests were at stake, we took up our guns and rushed to
save the Allies and make the world safe for democracy. A utilitarian
reason for saving our own necks--that is all that it was; and we cannot
close our eyes to our spiritual shortcomings.
Now we have the effrontery to interfere with the ships and shipping of
foreign countries. Let us see what will happen to us. Remember that
there is no War going on, to fill people with emotion and ecstasy.
This is to be a cold, steel-like remedying of troubles. Why should our
laws be respected, and those of other nations treated with contempt?
Who are we to say that a Latin sailor should not consume a glass of red
wine with his rations?
No one can tell what the Supreme Court will do; but it is rather
obvious that if America has closed up the saloons on shore she should
close them up on sea. If, walking a street in one of our cities, you
are under the protection of the Stars and Stripes, you are also under
that protection pacing the deck of an American liner. Prohibition must
follow the flag.
But some of the American lines are talking of changing the flag under
which they have been sailing! Here’s a howdy-do, here’s a pretty mess.
It is unthinkable that a liner should alter her citizenship, just
to carry a bit of beer. Yet that is what those staid old ladies are
contemplating. To what dreadful deportment are we driven, with Mr.
Volstead ruling us!
If our ships have to go dry, we will cut off the large freight business
in the West Indies, since much rum is exported from these islands.
There can be no transportation of wine to countries like France, Spain
and Italy; and, with such loss in revenue, how can our boats ply to
and fro? At this writing, hundreds of passengers have cancelled their
sailings on American vessels, incensed at the Attorney General’s
ruling.
The New York _World_, which has been a consistent and fearless enemy of
Prohibition, has published many fine editorials on the subject of a dry
sea; but none states the case better than this:
“Despite Mr. Lasker’s protest that it will ruin the American merchant
marine, the opinion of Attorney General Daugherty regarding the
sale of liquor on vessels flying the flag of the United States is
fairly certain to be upheld by the Courts. There is plenty of law and
precedent behind it. But every phase of law and precedent that supports
the opinion as it touches American shipping runs counter to the opinion
as applied to liners under alien flags.
“Ships chartered in the United States, according to Mr. Daugherty,
are subject to the laws of the United States, are, in fact, American
territory; but ships chartered in foreign countries are not foreign
territory. As soon as they enter American waters all vessels subject
themselves to American law, which means, of course, the Volstead Act.
How this comes about is not clearly explained. It would naturally be
supposed that if an American ship were American territory a British
ship would be British territory, and so on. Mr. Daugherty cannot have
it both ways. On one point or the other he must change his mind or have
it changed for him.
“But even though the enforcement law did not apply to European vessels
within the three-mile limit, it is difficult to discover in what
way they would violate it by carrying a sealed supply of liquor.
Possession of liquor, as defined by the courts, must include a change
of ownership. It is not legal for a manufacturer to ship liquor to
a consumer through the United States, but it is legal for an owner
of bonded liquor to remove it from one place to another within this
country. Alien ships traversing American waters with sealed liquor
aboard would be guilty of nothing which American citizens are not
allowed on land by judicial decision.”
Well, if the bars are closed forever on American ships, it will but add
to the present discontent; and again there will be an expression of
our national hypocrisy. It does not take much vision to see what will
inevitably happen. For just as people drink now on land when they feel
so inclined, they will drink upon the ocean; and every steward on every
American liner will become a bootlegger, whispering into the ears of
passengers something like this:
“Say, I have some fine old Scotch--the real thing--only twelve dollars
a bottle. Want some? I’ll see that it’s brought to your state-room. Oh,
no; there’s not a particle of danger. Everybody’s doing it.”
And thus will the comedy go on; thus will the playing of the farce be
extended beyond the three-mile limit, and within it, too; and once more
we will appear before the world in our cap and bells. No arrests will
be made. Things will simply drift along; and by and by, even though the
Eighteenth Amendment remains in the Constitution, and the Volstead
Act continues to be a part of our laws, both may be forgotten, just as
some of the old statutes of the Puritans, still upon the Massachusetts
records, have been allowed to float into a limbo of dreams.
The quandary which a ship finds herself in, sailing from Great Britain
to the United States, is laughable. John Bull demands, under his
democratic laws, made for freemen, that a certain amount of brandy be a
part of every cargo; whilst Uncle Sam, a tyrant now--refuses to permit
even a single jug of ale to enter the sacred three-mile limit. Between
Scylla and Charibdis the hardy mariner finds himself. On what reefs of
the mind a captain plunges as, dazedly trying to obey both laws, he
reads first one ruling and then the other. If he follows John, he is
out with Sam; if he sticks to Sam, he is the laughing-stock of John.
This might be the sad song of any sea-captain these days:
Tweedledum and Tweedledee,
Battledore and Shuttlecock!
Alack! alas! no more at sea
Is one allowed his rolling-stock!
But the end is not yet. Of course there will be concessions, many
wise shakings of the head, a profound slumber over tangled legal
documents, and then--perhaps--an awakening to the fact that after all
a holier-than-thou attitude scarcely pays in these times of human
frailty. We may realize, with our native intelligence, that we have
made a foolish, a terrible, a hideous mistake. Worse than being hated
by other nations is being laughed at by other nations. Can America
stand up against the mirth of Europe over our pig-headedness and smug
sanctimoniousness? If laughter has killed politicians, can it not kill
nations? If ridicule can end a career, can it not end national nonsense?
But somehow, despite heavy mandates and injunctions on the part of the
drys, something tells me that the ocean is going to remain indubitably,
irremediably, habitually, irritatingly and everlastingly wet.
No one seems to know just where we are destined, as a nation, to
take our way. We fuss and fume and fret. In the race of life, we put
endless obstructions along the track, and leap the hurdles clumsily,
falling now and then, picking ourselves up, falling again and otherwise
behaving rather ridiculously. What it all means no one seems to know.
Instead of letting well enough alone, we seem obsessed with the idea of
interfering incessantly with goodly folk. Suppression is in the air.
The skies are clear, but we put clouds in them--clouds that rise from
the earth because they are of our making. The dust of the world shuts
out the clean prospect ahead of us. We run about in circles, when, so
simply, we could march on a straight line. We are very, very stupid;
and though we know it now, we are afraid to admit it to ourselves.
Again our hypocrisy. Unable to respect ourselves and our own
institutions, how can we ask other peoples to do so?
In their eagerness to make the ocean round about the United States dry,
Prohibition officials even suggested to the Government that the Bahama
Islands be purchased from Great Britain. In this heavenly haven, it was
pointed out, rum-runners foregathered; perhaps England would help us
to make such conditions impossible in the future, and would be willing
to let the Islands come to us, in part payment of the old War debt.
But our own territory in that direction--Porto Rico and the Virgin
Islands--are still far from dry. With the problem of these localities
still unsettled, it would seem to be a piece of folly to lay hands on
the Bahamas, in the hope of “cleaning them up.”
Yet why stop, in our fanatic zeal, at the Bahamas? Why not reach out
and get the Canary Islands--indeed, everything everywhere. We who
preached aloofness until we were blue in the face, seem suddenly bent
upon interfering with all countries, no matter how remote they may
be. When men were actually, not potentially, in danger of death and
destruction, we would not lift a finger to aid them in Europe; but now,
with a mock holiness that ill comports with our attitude of a few years
ago, we are for saving a handful of drunkards from a terrible end.
And the pity of it is that we do not see how funny we are!