No
greater national service can be given by men and women of good
will--who, I know, are not unmindful of the responsibilities of
citizenship--than that they should, by their example, assist in
stamping out crime and outlawry by refusing participation in and
condemning all transactions with illegal liquor. Our whole system
of self-government will crumble either if officials elect what
laws they will enforce or citizens elect what laws they will
support. The worst evil of disregard for some law is that it
destroys respect for all law. For our citizens to patronize the
violation of a particular law on the ground that they are opposed
to it is destructive of the very basis of all that protection of
life, of homes and property which they rightly claim under other
laws. If citizens do not like a law, their duty as honest men and
women is to discourage its violation; their right is openly to
work for its repeal.
To those of criminal mind there can be no appeal but vigorous
enforcement of the law. Fortunately they are but a small
percentage of our people. Their activities must be stopped.
A NATIONAL INVESTIGATION
I propose to appoint a national commission for a searching
investigation of the whole structure of our Federal system of
jurisprudence, to include the method of enforcement of the
eighteenth amendment and the causes of abuse under it.
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