San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-03-01
LIQUOR IN RUSSIA.
Its Sale and Manufacture to Be Con-
trolled by the Government.

trolIed by the Government.
The liquor question can hardly be
called live issue in Russia, because
thnt would imply the existence of a
freedom of public discussion which is
not possible in the empire of the car,
But to the very capable set ofmen who
conduct the cars government, and
who are not changed with the fire.
quency common to more democratic
states, the liquor question has been for
years a subject of careful study.
Drunkenness is the curse of the Russian
peasant, and a paternal government,
which expelled the Jews to protect the
peasants against their wiles, can hard
ly be Indifferent to the agencies that are
supposed to promote the drinking
habits of the supplemented children
of the car. Probably ignorant
of the abject failure of the state of
South Carolina to make 4 success OF
a government monopoly of the liquor
business, the Russian administration
has undertaken the control of the man
ufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages.
Wine and beer it does not touch, but all
forms Of spirits must be distilled and
rectified under its supervision and sold
through its established agencies.
The Russian government has set
about this business with full appre-
citation of the magnitude of the prob
lem it has attacked. If the business
yields as much as the existing excise
duties, say $780, 100000 o year, the ex-
pertinent will be deemed success; but
do Is not expected that the government
monopoly will be universal throughout
the empire in less than 10 or Is years.
The immediate purpose is, first, to pro-
vide guarantee that only pure spirits
are sold; and, next, that they are sold
under conditions least calculated to
promote drunkenness. 1t is proposed
to discourage the country drinking
shop by providing that spirits shall be
sold there only at the price ut which
they are purchased from the govern
ment depot, and to reduce to a mini
mum in the towns the places where
the sale of drink by the glass is the
chief business. Russia consumes an
nually 3,250,0oO hectoliters of alcohol,
or about s6,000,0OO gallons. This is
rather less than the average eOnsump-
$ion of the United States. 1t is calcu-
lated that the consumption may de-
crease 20 per cent. without affecting
the amount of revenue which the new
system is calculated to produce.
On January I, 1895, the system was
established in four provinces of the en-
pire, having a population of S,0O0,Ooo,
or 10 per cent. of the whole. On July J
last it was extended to nine other prov
inces, with a population OF 81, 100000;
on January 1, 1897, it will be estab-
lished in another seven, with TO-
100000 inhabitants, and on January 1,
1898, it win take in Poland, with an
other 100000. BY 1898, therefore,
the system will be in operation over the
most populous part of Russia, and will
apply TO 100000 persons. The price
at which liquor shall be sold is fixed by
the imperial council, with approval OF
the emperor, and varies somewhat for
different provinces. In the places
where 1t is exposed for sale 1T can be
had only in closed bottles and TASKS
bearing the wax seal of the state and a
Itcket indicating the quantity, the de-
gree of strength and the price. The
liquor cannot be consumed at the place
where it is purchased. The "dispen-
sary" system, with limitation, is, in
short, the Russian plan, and it will be
interesting to see whether it decreases
drunkenness only at the cost of increas-
ing corruption.
Forthatrevelation however, the world
will have to wait some time.-Doston
Herald.