Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1886-07-10
ENGLAND'S DRINK BILL.
Figures That Offer no Encouragement TO
the Friends Of Temperance

the FrlenOS OF temperance
Once IA year the London Times makes
room for II detailed statement of Eng
lands drink bill. That statement has
been made by Mr.. William Hoyle, +. S.
| S., but this time another member of the
| Statistical society, Mr.. Dawson Burns,
ID. d.. signs his name to the report.
The British expenditure upon drink in
1885 was $616,343. 800 a decrease of
about $50, 000, 900 from the preceding
year. But Mr.. Burns says: .'ln re-
gard to causes of diminution we must,
] fear. look to the continued-and in
some quarters increasing-depreSsion
of trade rather than to the growth of
thrift and temperance in the country.
With the removal of this depression
we should most probably find the drink
bill become heavier, and its social con
sequences become darkcr.h This is a
reasonable inference from the statistics
Of preceding years. The state of trade
in England always reflects itself in the
drink bill. Mr.. Burns gives the foot
ings from 1860 to 1888 inclusive, and
they show this very plainly.
In that quarter of century the drink
bill has amounted from 1925, 600, 900
TO $G1G, 900, 900. Mr.. Burns says:
The years of commercial prosperity
l.,,,.lt 18th ,l,,, q, ,,.t1t n,,n,,,.nta1
expenditure upon strong drink, and
ever when that prosperity began TO
decline the special impetus that had
been given to drinking habits resisted
for a time, and yielded but slowly to
the stress of diminishing resources"
That is TO say that people by econo-
MIXING in other directions, and only cut
down the drink expenditure when they
were compelled to do so; even then
continuing to consume largely. Oh
course the increase between 1860 and
1855 is partly accounted for by the
growth of population, but Mr.. Burns
holds that allowing for this the increase
in the drink bill shows a decline rather
than progress in temperance. ut is
| clear he SAYS, "that the amount of
the national drink bill is still enormous,
being equal to the nations expenditure
for bread, butter and cheese; is not far
short of the rents paid for farms and
houses in the United Kingdom; is three
times the amount spent for tea, sugar,
coffee and cocoa, and J. six times TIE
amount of our expenditure on
linen and cotton goods" Tax
inc the families of the United
Kingdom at six millions, the gross eX-
pcnditure for drink in 1855, gives an
average expenditure per family of
$lO2.5O or reckoning five persons to a
family 5000 per head. OF course, if
those who do not drink ut all are sub
tracted, the average is very much
greater, rising, in fact, TO $40 per
family of five persons.
This is an enormous expenditure
upon drink; an enormou waste of cap
ital TO put the fact plainly, for the
money spent upon drink is as a rule
not only thrown away, but much worse
than thrown away, being expended in
the creation Of Il swarm of evils which
would not otherwise have existed. 1t
may well be asked what effect upon the
general wcll-being of Great Britain
would be produced by the expenditure
of this 5000, O00, 900 upon productive
industry, upon the necessaries of life,
upon land and horses. upon education,
books, pictures, all that ministers
to and develops the higher life of a ma
ton. There can be no doubt at AL that
a large percentage of the poverty, des-
titution, ignorance, misery, which per-
plexes society, would disappear if the
constant leak of the drink bill could be
stopped. But though there is much
movement in thinking circles at this
time. though social problems have
never been studied more seriously, the
development of luxury and gross ma
terial enjoyments proceeds wen more
rapidly than the evolution of patriotic
solicitude and intelligence, and the ex-
ample set by the rich is in no way
such as to incite the poor to self
restraint. England's drink bill is a
document which has for Americans
deep interest, for our own expenditure
in the same direction is a duplicate of
that of our cousins across the ocean,
and every consideration or argument
springing from and relating to the one
case has equal significance for the
other. How to get rid of this annual
record Of gross indulgence and suicidal
vice is the most pressing question in
in both branches of the great Anglo
Saxon family.-New York Tribune.