The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1883-12-01
The Brewers Usurpation.

The brewer is not a partisan, he is a
brewer. He uses politics as an instru-
men to kill opposition to his trade. and
he cares not straw what happens, so
that he is permitted to follow his more
than dangerous trade unmolested. He
does not ask what effect the election of
this man or the other will have upon
the State-the only question is: ''What
effect it will have upon my brewery"
is he for free beer, or opposed to it?"
And the beer-seller echoing his cry,
for he is owned by the brewer, joins
him, and they vote and compel votes
from this consideration only
Demagogues use them, or rather bar
gain with them, and hence, the way
parties are divided, beer has become a
potent power in American politics.
So long as the beer interest kept to it.
self and was followed in a legitimate
way to supply a natural demand there
was no especial notice taken of it. In
deed the introduction of beer was con-
sidered by not small portion of the
community as an aid to Temperance, in
asmuch as it supplied weaker liquorito
take somewhat the place of stronger
But the cupidity of the brewers has
made beer a greater curse than whisky.
The brewing Observation-Disclosures there
are honorable exceptions-ha become
the apostle of drunkenness. 1t has be-
come the educator of the people in eX-
cess. 1t has put in position to do harm
the most dangerous classes of the COM
munity, in the most constituencies man.
ner; it is furnishing material to utterly
constituencies men whose profit it is to
debauch the young, to entice the I'M
wary and careless, and to make thieves
of boys and drunkards of sober men.
That is exactly what the brewer who
is in the business of establishing sa-
looms, indiscriminately, is doing, and
he knows that he is doing it.
He is not supplying legitimate de-
! mand for intoXicants-he is deliberate
ly educating men and boys into their
use, who, but for him, would never or
seldom touch them.
1t must be borne in mind that the
brewer is not content to sell beer to
those who are established in the bust
ness, in compliance with public de-
mand. He wants wider market for
his beer and he creates it. He finds
man fitted by nature for the business,
/ but without capital and he furnishes
the capital. He fits up the rooms, he
furnishes the counters, the beer-coolers,
the key of beer and whisky, the cards
in the back room, and the pool-table in
the front, he pays for the screens be-
hind which dissipation may commence
unseen, and he puts the fellow whom
ha bo
with instructions that he must sell so
much beer a day to insure his con-
tinuance.
The saloon man of this class goes
about his business Systematically. He
makes the place pleasant for men and
secure for boys. He labors to build
up a business just the same as shoe
maker or tailor would, not to secure the
custom of those already using beer, but
to train stomachs into its use, that the
volume of trade may be increased. He
makes new beer-drinkers, and he does
not care a straw of what material he
makes them. The boy who steals his
mothers linen to pay for it is welcome
customer; the laborer whose family
needs the money he is pouring down
swash is consumed and paid for. Every
brewer who is in the business of fitting
out saloons, commissions and equips
scores of pirates, and sends them out to
prey upon women and children.
There may be some excuse for the
man who commences the business HIM
self, in locality where the people call
for it, but there can be no apology for
this forcing of the trade, this enticing
and educating men and boys in the use
of stimulants that profit may be made
out of their unnaturally acquired appe-
tites. When brewers number their own
shops by the hundred there is some
thing more than natural in the business.
Every shop thatssa brewer is compelled
to equip is just that one too many.
There are enough conducted by men of
some sort of moral feeling, and some
sort of decency, to do all the business
necessary on their own account. All
the rest is forced.
This is no over-statement. In every
city there are miles of low doggeries
which are merely the places of resort
for thieves of all grades and ages,
where boys are educated in crime and
those graduated are protected, and
liquor is, always, first the educator and
later the solace of these half or whole
! criminals
The brewers and distillers can not es-
cape responsibility for these training
schools of vice, and these dives that are
cancers on the body polite. Do they not
know their characters Knowing their
character do they not supply them just
the same as they do the respectable
places? Do not their delivery wagons
stop every morning in front of these
places the same as in front of the re-
spectacle shops? DO they not know
that the beer they sell to the boys rem
devious is to be used to the debauching
Of boys, and that the money which the