"It Is the Law"

PROHIBITION

"It Is the Law"

Mr. Wesley Wait of Newburgh, N. Y., wrote a letter to President Harding urging him to take action if Governor Smith of New York should sign a bill passed by the state legislature to repeal New York's prohibition enforcement law. Said Mr. Wait: " Every state official who voted for this bill is subject to the law of treason, having taken the oath to sustain the Constitution of the United States."

President Harding, by writing a reply, took the occasion to make known his views on prohibition. His letter is termed in several quarters "the opening gun of the campaign of 1924."

After saying that it did not seem fitting " to enter upon a discussion of a situation which has not yet arisen," he went on to make the following points:

That the nation " deliberately, after many years of consideration" adopted the 18th Amendment.

That the national government will enforce it.

That state officials are also sworn to enforce the Constitution.

That states have police and judicial machinery to enforce the law.

That if they decline to do so, the Federal Government will have to do so for them, with the result that "many complex and extremely difficult situations must arise."