The Palatka daily news. (Palatka, Fla.) 1884-1888, 1888-01-10

tors and Congressmen to attempt the re
| peal of the odiocs laws. The Senate
here gave Illustrations of the hardship
| worked by the revenue laws in Georgia
| and statistics of seizures and arrests, ans
| argued that the facts given demonstrate
an outrageously oppressive and iniqui
tous system that should never be fol
lowed by Republican government, ex
cept when necessary, under war or othel
great calamities, and never to raise sur
plus money in the Treasury.
The discrimination against tobacco ane
whisky made by the internal revenus
| system, he said, constituted a strong OBJ
| lection to it.
THE WHISKY MoNoPOLT.
The whisky tax occupies a peculiar
position. The whisky taxpayer does no,
desire to have the tax abolished. Whisky
| distillers get an enormous profit out of
it, which they do not wish to be de-
prived of, and they enjoy a monopoly as
a great association of protected capital
lists, that they do not wish to give up.
There is no monopoly on the American
continent comparable to that of the
great whisky ring. 1t is protected by a
tariff of 81 gallon on all imported
whisky from other countries, so that at
the custom house the whisky men are
the best protected of American citizens
from foreign competition The laws
carefully protect the whisky monopolist
against loss by leakage, casualty, or de-
struction by fire. He has a good thing
of it with whisky cared for by the
Government for three years at
no cost to himself, with over
one-sixth of his whisky 81
lowed as leakage and the privilege of
expectation without paying any tax
And if he fails to sell his whisky abroad
and brings it back in the original pack
age he simply pays ninety cents tax,
while the foreign whisky by its side pays
$2 a gallon import duty. This is an ad-
vantage of $1.10 over foreign imports
1t may be thought that the whisky ring
has no monopoly because every Ameri-
can citizen can engage in the same busi-
ness. This is a mistake. Before the pas
sage of this law there was large num-
Der of small disuillers over the country
who did not average five gallons day.
In the mountain regions of Georgia a
small farmer, seventy-five miles from a
railroad, making 100 bushels of corn for
sale could not haul it across
the mountains to market, as the carriage
is worth half the corn, but could distill
it into whisky and transport it to rail-
road with profit and get money to buy
necessities. These small distillers made
the great aggregate of whisky. The
whisky monopOlists had to be protected
against these small home distillers, so
that a regulation was passed forbidding
any one to be licenced unless he could
distill twenty gallons of whiskey every
three days. If they make whisky with
out licence they have to go to Jail, and
they cannot get a licence To make whisky
in less amount than twenty gallons
every three days. Thus protected against
foreign whisky in the custom house, S2
gallon duty, and from home distillers
by restricted licence, the whisky monopo-
list has an easy time, and against the
little distillers he has the whole power of
the courts, including spies, collectors,
marshals, district attorneys, and the
Albany penitentiary.
TOBACCO A NECESSITY.
1t is said the internal revenue repeal
will turn whisky and tobacco loose
ha< tl.er
sites, both are luxuries, and it is better
to lower the tariff and give the poor free
trace chains and free wool hats, which
are cheaper than they ever were before,
than to give them free tobacco and free
whisky. Tobacco has become a neces-
sity, and even if a luxury people will
have it, and the money for tobacco is
taken from the family support. Every
dollar of tax, therefore, on tobacco that
is taken off gives the poor man so much
more to supply his family, and will
probably be a greater relief than any
other act of legislation could furnish
which does not reduce the tax to a
greater amount.
THE RULE APPLIES TO WHISKY.
The same rule applies substantially to
whisky. 1t may be denied that
it is necessary, and yet few
| families do not use it, and
they will continue to use it at any price.
When we put 80 cents tax on what cost
20 cents a gallon, we put a tax of 300
per cent. on what the laboring man will
have, and relief in this matter will help
the poor. 1t is asserted that the repeal
of this tax will turn everybody loose to
make whiskey, bring the price down and
cause more drinking. This the Senator
held to be a mistake. The production
in 1887 added to the stock in hand at the
beginning of the year gives nearly two
and one fourth gallons to each man
woman and child in the country. Nc
other system will keep more on hand tc
tempt the people or keep so much wher
own expenses. Georgia has paid since
the war, under the internal revenus
law, $22, 2,3.5 900 into the Fedora
treasury, or about $1,OOO,OOO a year
This would almost pay the amount o
direct tax levied by the State govern
ment of Georgia for its own support
and leave the farmers and their pianta
tions, live stock and property almos
free from taxation. Under State con
troll offenders would be tried in their owl
countries and there would be a correc
ton of the abuses of the present cours.
of Justice. The more oppressive feature