Providers v. Recipients

Faces familiar to a thousand U. S. businessmen's conventions assembled in Halifax last week, but there was one difference. This time it was the bootleggers who made the speeches.

Despite published reports, this was not the first International Rum Runners & Bootleggers' Convention. But it was one of the most important and it was the first attended by the Press. Montreal trains, boats from New York and Boston, brought the delegates, most of whom seemed to be named Smith and called "Looey." Few of the I. R. R. & B. would talk. Newshawks amused themselves for a while by having

Vannie Higgins. one of the most potent of Manhattan runners and leader of the convention, paged in the hotels. Mr. Higgins, though present, did not respond. Several of his assistants persuaded reporters that they were acting unwisely.

One delegate did take pity on the Press. He explained that this was a meeting of the "Providers" (captains and owners of rum ships) and the "Recipients" (runners who slip the cargoes over the 12-mile limit and distribute it in the U. S.) Rum ships, he added, never clear for the U. S. from Halifax itself. To spare the feelings of Canadian big-port authorities members of the I. R. R. & B. use the smaller Canadian ports of Liverpool, Shelburne, Meteghan, Yarmouth (all in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia).

"You see, this is the annual Spring conference," explained Looey XVI. "We're just going to talk things over like and map out the Nova Scotia Province fairly for future business, to eliminate duplication of effort and waste in other forms and to weed out graft. Yes, you heard me! I said: 'Wipe out graft.'"

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