George Iles
Published: 2010-10
Total Pages: 0
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: The Liquor Question in Politics. The term liquor being for convenience' sake used to include not only distilled alcoholic stimulants, but also wine, ale, and beer, the liquor question fills two places in politics. First, in so far as the liquor business is organized or represented as a political interest to protect or promote itself. Second, in so far as this business is the subject of legislation for its special taxation, restriction, or suppression. As the extremely variable element of retail profit enters into estimates, it is impossible to say exactly how much the nation's annual outlay for liquor is. It is certainly not less than a thousand million dollars, and may be even a fifth more. The vast business which this outlay represents is highly organized: the trust system which has consolidated so many other branches of manufacture has been extended to whiskey; agreements as to wages and prices have drawn together for concerted action the majority of brewers in the United States. There are throughout the Union numerous associations not only of distillers and brewers, but also of wine- producers, liquor-dealers, and saloon-keepers, supporting trade journals of large circulation, maintaining a literary bureau, and employing special counsel to watch State and national law- making in their behalf. New York City as the nation's metropolis presents the developments of the liquor trade in their highest form. On December 31, 1888, there were 7809 places in the city licensed to sell liquor to be drank on the premises. In addition there were 971 stores licensed to sell liquor not to be drank on the premises. Assuming the city's population to be 1,500,000, there was onelicense to every 171 inhabitants. The receipts for licenses during 1888 were $1,430,420, an average of $162. Wi...