The aftermath pertaining to the latest prohibition massacre when three rum-runners were slain with a minimum of warning by the Coast Guard defenders is proving almost as interesting as the incident itself, and certainly more humorous. The Treasury Department, although admitting it is not in complete possession of the facts, as candidly declares the Coast Guard is incapable of wrong-doing while engaged in the pursuitence duty. Assistant Secretary Low man yesterday was more astute or perhaps more bewildered, so far as silence may be taken as a criterion. It is merely a matter of choice.

Although an excellent method for rigid enforcement of the Eighteenth Amendment and probably the only one approximating any degree of success, wholesale killings on a slight pretext leave the majority of thoughtful citizens cold. Major punishment meted out for minor infringements has never enjoyed a wide degree, of appeal. In view of the rather disagreeable incidents that Prohibition has foisted on the attention of the American public during the last decade, there is a considerable amount of justice in the fact that the noble experiment is celebrating its tenth anniversary with a plentitude of dramatic, if somewhat disturbing pyrotechnics. The war is on in earnest.