ting the public
opinion of the people as to the liquor traffic by demonstrating to
them that this trade was in deadly hostility to every interest of
the State, while no good came from it, nor could come from it, to
State or people.

This educational work was carried on persistently for years;
meetings were held by these persons in every little country-church
and town-house, and in every little wayside school-house, where the
farmers and their wives and children assembled at the call of these
missionaries, to listen to their burning denunciation of the liquor
traffic, which lived only by spreading poverty, pauperism,
suffering, insanity, crime and premature death broadcast over the
State. The result of this teaching was, that the public opinion of
the State became thoroughly changed as to the character of the
liquor traffic and its relation to the public prosperity and
welfare.

When we thought the time had come for it, we demanded of the
Legislature that the law of "license," then upon the statute books,
which represented the public opinion of the old time, should be
changed for a law of prohibition, representing the improved public
opinion of the present time; and, after two unsuccessful attempts
to procure such a law, we obtained what we desired, an act of
absolute prohibition to the manufacture and sale of strong drink--a
measure for which we had labored long and industriously for many
years.

At the time of the enactment of this statute, now known as the
MAINE LAW the world over, the liquor traffic was carried on
extensively in the State, wholesale and retail, precisely as it is
now in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and in every other State
where that trade is licensed and protected by the law. The Maine
Law went into operation immediately upon its approval by the
Governor, and by its provisions, liquors kept for sale everywhere,
all over the State, were liable to be seized, forfeited and
destroyed, and the owners to be punished by fine and imprisonment.
The municipal authorities of the cities and towns allowed the
dealers a reasonable time to send away their stocks of liquors to
other States and countries, where their sale was permitted by the
law.

The liquor-traders availed themselves of this forbearance of the