PROHIBITION SURVEY OF WEST VIRGINIA REPORT OF FRANK BUCKLEY, OF THE BUREAU OF PROHIBITION, TREASURY DEPARTMENT, SUBMITTING DETAILED INFORMATION RELATIVE TO A SURVEY OF PROHIBITION ENFORCEMENT IN THE STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA SURVEY OF PROHIBITION ENFORCEMENT IN WEST VIRGINIA By FRANK BUCKLEY, Bureau of Prohibition, Treasury Department STATEMENT This report presents a survey of Federal, State, county, and municipal law-enforcement machinery available in the State of West Virginia, as well as data pertaining to prohibition and enforcement thereof in the same territory. Information upon which such survey is based was assembled after a study of statutory, judicial, and personnel machinery now functioning in the above State. An effort was also made to ascertain the extent of cooperative effort prevailing among law-enforcement agencies there. General law-enforcement conditions in West Virginia are most encouraging. State, county, municipal, and town officials, with but few exceptions, from the Governor down to the humblest constable, manifest a genuine determination to enforce all laws honestly and impartially. Federal forces, too, working in harmony with State organizations, evince a similar desire. Public opinion in West Virginia is also strongly intrenched behind legislation designed for improvement of social and moral conditions. A striking illustration of the depth of prohibition sentiment there may be taken from the protest that arose recently, when the State Code Commission attempted to remove teeth from provisions of the State road law which authorize imposition of both fine and imprisonment against drunken vehicle operators. So great an outcry was raised by leading newspapers, representatives of the American Federation of Labor, women's clubs, and like organizations, that the senate promptly enacted a resolution discarding the entire proposal. The only real wet sentiment in the State centers about the city of Wheel ing, the population of which dominates Ohio County. It is interesting to note, in passing, that organizers of the association against the eighteenth amendment are now attempting to generate wet consciousness in West Virginia with but little success. Several factors contribute to the marked respect for law and estab lished order prevalent in West Virginia. A practically homogeneous citizenry is undoubtedly one of such factors. Federal census statistics, compiled in 1920, place the native white element at approximately 90 per cent of the entire population. Foreign-born residents represented at that time but 4 per cent of the whole. About three-fourths of the entire State population is scattered through rural districts, an added factor contributing to the general demand for law observance prevalent there. Rural or country communities, removed from metropolitan distractions, free from the varied racial influences prevalent in industrial centers, live more simply, cherish ideals of good government more fervently, and exact a stricter account of stewardship from those whom they elevate to public office. An educational system that goes to the extent of providing buses for conveyance of children from remote country districts to public schools also contributes materially to the general respect for law evident in the State. Inhabitants of some of the more detached mountain hamlets have, in the past, regarded law-enforcement officers as natural enemies-legitimate targets for long-range shots from ambush. State police, by virtue of a program of education inaugurated by the public safety commission, are now occupied in an effort to teach these primitive people the significance of law and the necessity for enforcement thereof. Inaccessibility, a one-time serious barrier to law enforcement in the State, is being gradually eliminated. A road-construction program, involving an expenditure of $13,500,000, and already half completed, proposes to connect every county seat with modern highways, many of which in the past, were accessible in adverse weather only to horse and wagon conveyances. STATUTES STATE PROHIBITION LAW Set up in carefully conceived, foolproof phraseology, bristling with severe penalties, covering the entire field of possible violations, the Yost law, effective in West Virginia since July, 1914, stands as one of the most drastic, yet most effective, liquor enactments in the United States. (Ch. 32 A, Code W. Va.) The most sensational feature of the law is to be found in section. 37, which makes ownership, operation, maintenance, or possession of what is commonly known as a moonshine still a felony punishable by a fine of not less than $100 nor more than $1,000, together with imprisonment in the penitentiary for not less than one nor more than five years. This same section carries a provision which makes the possession or manufacture of home-brew a misdemeanor punishable, for the first offense, by fine of not less than $25 nor more than $100, and for the second or subsequent offenses, confinement in the county jail for not more than one year and, in the court's discretion, a fine of not less than $100 nor more than $500. A provision contained in section 32 of the same act, giving justices of the peace concurrent jurisdiction with circuit and other courts having criminal jurisdiction for trial of misdemeanors arising under the same law, materially lessens the burdens of higher tribunals and thus insures expeditious disposition of all prohibition cases. Search and seizure provisions of the law, found in section 9 thereof, authorize issuance of a search warrant by a justice of the peace, circuit, criminal, or intermediate court, or the mayor of any city, town, or village, upon information made under oath or examination that any person is manufacturing, selling, offering, or exposing, keeping, or storing for sale or barter any liquors, or that the affiant has cause to believe and does believe that such liquors so manufactured, sold, offered, kept, or stored for sale or barter in any house, building, or other place named therein, contrary to provisions of this act, etc. The above provisions of the law have been passed upon and upheld by the Supreme Court of West Virginia in several cases. In State v. Kees (92 W. Va. 277) the same court held that the fact that a complainant, in the information upon which a search warrant was issued, indicated that the same was conveyed to him by another, and not known to him personally, would not serve to invalidate such warrant. Penalties available under the act are worthy of note. Section 3 makes any person acting for himself, or by, for, or through another, who sells, keeps, stores, offers or exposes for sale, solicits or receives orders for any liquors, guilty of a misdemeanor for the initial offense and subject to a fine of not less than $100 or more than $500; for the second offense guilty of a felony, punishable by confinement in the penitentiary for not less than one nor more than five years. The same provisions also make it the duty of all prosecuting attorneys to ascertain whether or not offenses brought to their attention fall in the latter category, and in such event to include a statement to that effect in any indictment that may follow. In connection with the above the Supreme Court of West Virginia has held that a second offense does not mean a violation of the same section but a violation of any section of the prohibition law, including all amendments thereof. (State v. Vendetta, 86 W. Va. 186.) Section 32, above noted, also contains a provision that is in the nature of a penalty, and which imposes a fee of $25 as a part of the costs in all prohibition cases. All fees thus collected revert to the State prohibition commissioner for use in enforcement of the law. The use, gift, barter, or sale as a beverage, or distribution or division of liquor in clubhouses or associations, or the maintenance of or association in the same for such purposes is prohibited in section 6 and made punishable by a fine of not less than $10 nor more than $500 and imprisonment of not less than 30 days nor more than 6 months. Mayors, municipal police, county and district officers in the State are vested with the duty of enforcing the prohibition law within their respective jurisdictions by section 29. This same section also provides for removal from office of any of the above officials upon proof of refusal or neglect on their part to discharge the duty imposed as above described. Authority is granted, in section 15, to the State commissioner of prohibition, his agents, and deputies to summon any male citizen to |