Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1882-03-31
Some Curious Liquor tatistics.
Baltimore sam.

The St. Louis Republican has institut-
| ed a curious comparison. Assuming it
to be fact that there are many Repub-
| licans who in their extreme partisanship,
''never doubt that substantially all the
morality and sobriety in the country are
embraced in the Republican party" our
st. LOUIS contemporary institutes an in
vestigation to ascertain to what extent
| such an assumption is sustained by the
reports of the Commissioner of Internal
Revenue. Fixing upon the number of
saloons in the several States as indicative
of the drinking propensities of the popu-
lation, the Republican resorts to the sta
tistical tables published by the Commits.
sioner for the number of retail and
wholesale dealers in liquor in the United
| States, their location. the number
of distilleries, and the total production
| in gallons for the year ended July 1,
1881. These tables show that the total
number of liquor saloons is 40, $40 in a
population of 80. 155, 1888, and that,
"taking the country over, there is one
saloon to every 294 people" The Repu6
| LicGn next separates the States that voted
for Garfield from those that voted for
| Hancock, and as the statistical tables in
| dictate the number of saloons in each
State, it finds that in the Garfield or
Republican States there is one saloon for
every 2e0 people, while in the Hancock
or Democratic States there is one saloon
for every 4S0 people Arguing from
| these facts that morality and sobrietY go
| together, the Republican reaches the con-
clusion that as the preponderance of
| liquor drinking is in those States where
| the Republicans are In majority the NOR
| ais of the population must be correspond
inglv deteriorated. Speaking in the light
Of the statistics which it gives, the Re
| publican finds "that there is much less
liquor drank in Democratic States and
| communities in proportion to population
than in Republican States and communi-
ties. The current belief, it adds, 'has
been wholly at variance from this. 1t is
to be remarked, too, that the Southern
States show a much smaller ratio Of sa-
looms than the Northern and Western
States. And this would be true even if
the n -groes were left entirely out
of the question, and all the sa-
looms credited to the whites alone 1t is
remarkable, too, that Missouri has fewer
saloons in proportion TO population than
Massachusetts,, or. to come nearer home,
) than Illinois" We do not place much
trust in statistics of this kind, while not
denying the pertinency Of the figures as
showing to what extent liquor drinking
prevails throughout the United States.
| The error lies in the assumption that the
States classed as Republican are COM
posed wholly of Republican popula-
ton, aud vice versa; whereas,
in point of fact, the popuIa-
ton in many of them is almost equally
divided between the two great political
parties. 1t is, therefore, a reasonable in
ference that it is not the Republicans
only who frequent the saloons. The
worst thing that the figures given by the
Commissioner of Internal Revenue show
is that, taking the country throughout,
'there is one liquor dealer to about
every fifty male inhabitants. Another
noteworthy thing is that in Massachu-
sets, where the liquor law is supposed
to be vigorously enforced, there are no
less than 1879 retail stores and saloons
where liquor is sold more or less openly