Temperance movement in New Zealand

The Temperance movement in New Zealand was a movement that aimed at the prohibition of the sale of alcohol. Although it met with local success it narrowly failed to impose national prohibition on a number of occasions in the early twentieth century.

In 1836, the first recorded temperance meeting was held in the Bay of Islands (Northland). The 1860s saw the foundation of a large number of temperance societies. Many provinces passed licensing ordinances giving residents the right to secure, by petition, the cancellation or granting of liquor licences in their district. The Licensing Act of 1873 allowed the prohibition of liquor sales in districts if petitioned by two-thirds of residents. Despite the efforts of the temperance movement, the rate of convictions for drunkenness remained constant in New Zealand. The rapid increase in the number of convictions for public drunkenness was more a reflection of the growing population rather than social deterioration.In 1886, a national body called the New Zealand Alliance for Suppression and Abolition of the Liquor Traffic was formed, pushing for control of the liquor trade as a democratic right.

Early in 1886, arrangements were made for T. W. Glover, a lecturer from the United Kingdom Alliance, to conduct prohibition missions in various New Zealand centres. On 1 March 1886, at the Rechabite Hall, Wellington, 30 delegates – representing Auckland, Nelson, Hawke's Bay, Woodville, Canterbury, New Plymouth, Dunedin, Wellington, Alexandra (Otago), Invercargill, Greymouth, Masterton, the Blue Ribbon Union, the Good Templars Lodge, the Rechabite Lodge, and the Wellington Alliance met, to establish a union of the temperance alliances in New Zealand. This conference formed and drafted a constitution for the New Zealand Alliance for the Suppression of the Liquor Traffic and the following officers were elected: president, Sir William Fox; sixteen vice-presidents, including D. Goldie, Hori Ropiha, Sir H. A. Atkinson, L. M. Isitt, and Sir Robert Stout; executive committee, F. G. Ewington, Edward Withy, George Winstone, H. J. Le Bailey, J. Elkin, Dr C. Knight, John Waymouth, and R. Neal. H. Field (Nelson) became the first general secretary and T. W. Glover the first paid organiser. The conference adopted the United Kingdom Alliance's (1853) declaration of principles.

Towards the end of the 19th century, it became apparent that problems associated with settlement, such as larrikinism and drunkenness, were growing in society. Increasing urbanization heightened public awareness of the gap between social aspirations and reality of the young colony. Generalisations from newspapers, visiting speakers & politicians in the 1890s allowed development of large public overreaction and fervour to the magnitude of the problem of alcohol. It became the firm opinion of a number of prominent New Zealanders that the colony’s problems were associated with alcohol.

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