PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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Reference :-
TC.O.885
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3 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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reign of James I; for the parish stocks in those days knew their own, and 5s. was rather a large sum of money. The first step in an amendment of this helpless state of the law would be to provide a maximum 'punishment less frivolous and futile; the next, when a fine only is awarded, to authorize commitment to prison without the interval of a week for paying it; and the third to make adequate provision for the families of offenders during the imprisonment awarded ; since the drunkard is often let off lest his family should suffer.
But there is a wide distinction to be taken between different kinds and varieties of drunken- ness. 1st. There is the distinction between private or domestic and public drunkenness. Drunkenness unaggravated by other offences can only be punished when it presents itself in public; but it may be a question whether, in a penal code intended for a society more amenable than ours, and less divided by perversity and contrariety of interested opinion, public-houses should not he placed on the same footing with public thorough- Cares.
2nd. Casual drunkenness unaggravated is to be distinguished from habitual drunken- ness unaggravated. 3rd. There is drunkenness aggravated by disorderliness and offensiveness though not by punishable offences. 4th. There drunkenness aggravated by punishable
is
offences.
Mere casual intoxication and nothing more should be visited with a fine proportioned, so
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far as may be, to the means of the offender, or a light imprisonment if he is unable to pay a fine. Habitual drunkenness ascertained by repeated convictions, but not in any of the cases of conviction aggravated by punishable offences or by disorderliness or offensiveness, should be punished by imprisonment of such length as may afford a prospect that the habit of drinking will be broken: but the imprison- ment should not be needlessly penal. Habitual drunkenness ascertained in like manner and aggravated by disorderliness and offensiveness should be punished by imprisonment also of the requisite length for breaking the habit and of a more penal character. Ilabitual drunkenness ascertained in like manner and accompanied in one or more of the previous cases, but not in the actual case, by punishable offences of a violent and cruel character, should be punished by whip- ping and by the like imprisonment. Habitual drunkenness aggravated in the actual case by punishable offences, should be punished by im- prisonment of a length sufficient to break the habit of drinking in addition to such punishment: for the offences aggravating the drunkenness as those offences may have incurred.
In short, the principle should be that drunken- ness is under all eircumstances an offence, though when committed in private it cannot be properly reached by the law; and that if habitual, in what- ever form it can be legitimately made amenable, imprisonment of such lengths as to give the
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