New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1897-08-22

markedly low. There are only thirty mine places
where strong drink can be bought for immediate
consumption. and there only thirty shops.
seven Of which controlled directly by the
company where spirits be purchased In
quantity for use elsewhere
Third-Meals supplied to the poorest
classes at the lowest prices In addition to the
eighteen public-houses. where meals served
there are four cheap eating houses. where any
applicant receives a bowl Of soup and half a loaf
or bread for less than penny and where for
twopence dinner of neat. vegetables and bread
is provided These meals are served for less
than cost. and the loss is charged to the COM
panys account. Five reading rooms are main
tanned at the expense of the company. where
non alcoholic drinks alone provided. Proba-
bly there Is no other town in Europe where the
poor are enabled to obtain wholesome food at so
low cost.
Fourth-The liquor business has been convert
ed into source of revenue to the town The
licensing company is allowed to retain . per
cent on its pad-up capital. The remaining net
profits are available for public use. The state
treasury receives three-tenhs. the Agricultural
Society one-tenth, and the town treasury six
tenths The aggregate payments to the public
authorities for a single year are about I2G.OOO
krones IA little over English shilling) from
the fixed rate for the licensing monopoly and
from the profits of the business approximately
over $1S1,0W. In Stockholm and other towns
the same system prevails with some modifica-
tons in the public uses for which the profits are
treasury is redivided among the provincial agri-
cultural societies in proportion to population
BEER IN PLACE OF CHEAP SPIRITS.
While the Gothenburg system has involved
marked Improvement in publc-houses. it has
not stamped out intemperance, is clearly
shown by the police returns for arrests FOR
drunkenness and dsorderly conduct. Compare
sons Of these returns are misleading on account
of the great increase of population during the
allowance
made for the morals Of fourishing port where
sailors have shore privileges after long voyages,
the advocates of the system constrained to
admit that the results are disappointing from
the temperance point of view. They explain this
failure of the system by the multiplication Of
beer and wine shops, over which the licensing
company has no control.
Fifty years ago Sweden fairly flooded
with cheap brandy. There few railways
and distances were long. and farmers found it
| more profitable TO convert their rye, corn and
potatoes into spirits than to carry them to the
nearest market. Every farm had its small STILL
| The poorest cottagers made raw brandy and
| drank il heavily. Distillation taxed so
! lightly to be virtually free. and there were
/ few refneries. In town and country these raw
spirits. reekng with fusi oil. were consumed by
/ old and young and the nation was on the high
road to ruin. Beer was then expensive and
practically unknown in Sweden Everybody
/ drank the cheapest and worst spirits which were
ever made. and intemperance was the chief ma
tional vice. Everybody now drinks beer.
The temperance reformers. who devised the
/ Gothenburg system a safeguard against pau
perism. and secured the enactment of legisla-
| ton against the manufacture and sale of spirits.
fighting a BATE against a single enemy.
Brandy the national curse. No reformer
! thought of proposing any restrictions upon the
sale of wine beer There was 10 legislation
against any liquor except brandy. AT first the
! home distilleries were suppressed, taxation upon
the manufacture Of spirits was largely increased
and distilling was confined TO large towns where
| it could be regulated. Next local option law
was passed, and every community was left at
liberty TO restrict the sale of brandy and to
regulate public houses Finally town and pro-
vincal councils were empowered to hand over
to respectable licensing companies the exclusive
privilege of selling liquors The experience or
| Gothenburg proved that this was safer
plan than to leave the regulation of the liquor
! traffic under the control Of committees of the
| local councils In these reform campaigns
| brandy was the only enemy with which battle
was offered Neither beer wine was subject
to local option, or to the operation Of the Gothen-
burg system.
restaurants where spirits can be bought for inn
mediate consumption in Gothenburg. there ere
S43 gardens and shops where beer or wine can
be had For every ten thousand inhabitants
there are two and six tenth places where spirits
are sold. and seventy-eight and eighteenth
places where beer can be freely bought The pion-
GERS of the Gothenburg system point to these fig
ures as the unerring proof that Sweden now
| A. cded with beer and wine whereas thirty years
ago 1t was deluged with cheap brandy. They as
sert that the go,. results accomplished by the reg
ulation of the spirits traffic have been counterbal-
anced by the defects of the Swedish liquor laws,
which prevent the application or the Gothenpurs
system TO beer. "Proclaiming the Gothenoutg
system in spirits failure" remarks one of the
reformers because people get drunk from beer
seems much like proclaiming vaccination a rail-
ure because people die from scarlet tever. me
radical reformers contend that the Gothenburg
system must ultimately be extended 10 peer gar
dens and wineshops before its main object can be
complished-practical temperance REFORM win
the evils of drink mnmZed l. ~ r.
|