The San Francisco call., 1898-07-10
TAX ON WINE
 IS PROTESTED Meeting of Saloon anC Restaurant Keepers. AN APPEAL TO WASHINGTON IN ITS PRESENT SHAPE THE LAW IS INoPERATIVE The Rosy Will Be Served in Pitchers and in Glasses and the Gov
 ernment Will Receive
 No Tax at All.
AN APPEAL TO WASHINGTON
IN ITS PRESENT SHAPE THE
 LAW IS INoPERATIVE.

No clause In the war revenue stamp bill | has given more trouble caused more | dissatisfaction than that requiring a one | cent stamp to be placed on every bottle
 of wine of not more than pint and a two | cent stamp on every bottle of more than
 pint The requirement is specially bur | densome to the managers of French res- | taurantS where wine is served with din- | ner without extra charge. Every time a
 bottle is reflled a new stamp must be put
 on, and the Special Agent of the Revenue | Department must either trust to the self | sacrificing honesty of the restauranteurs
 or keep a force of spies boarding at
 every restaurant in the United States, and
 detail of special detectives to take up
 their quarters in the saloons.
 | Neither of these propositions will work | well, and the result will be that Uncle Sam will not succeed in collecting all of
 the tax. Then, again, restaurant and sa- 1 loon men may draw wine from barrel 1 and serve it in drinking glasses or pitch CTS and not have to pay any tax at all, so
 that no tax whatever will be collected up-
 on wines, except on champagnes and oth-
 CT high-prced bottled kinds.
 The specially annoying and objection | able feature of the law is the trouble it
 will cause retailers and others in affixng
 the stamps every time bottle is rehlled. l Restaurant men say that it will be bur-
 densome in cases where the customer | drinks only one glass out of bottle, for | they will be obliged to pay two cents for l the privilege of replacing the glassful that has been taken or to empty the remain ing contents of the bottle into the barrel
 to be drawn again into the bottle. in which event the tax must be paid twice on the same wine, proceeding not con- templated by Congress when the bill was enacted into a law.
 A large number of restaurant men and saloon keepers held meeting last Friday night for the purpose of taking steps to have the Commissioner of Internal Rev. enue make ruling to remove the burden some and unnecessary features of the act. in so far as it applies to their busi- ness. As a result of the meeting Customs Broker YOungberg was employed to draft a petition to the Commissioner at Wash ington setting forth the reasons why he should make a ruling that will remove the objectionable operations of the law. The petition will be ready tomorrow and will be presented to the parties interested for signatures
 Wetmore, Bowen Company, a corporation dealing exclusively in bottled wines. ex- pressed the opinion that the wine tax should be collected in the same manner as the beer tax and the whisky tax, name ly in the winery, as the tax on the other liquors is collected in the brewery, the dtstillery and the bonded warehouse. If this were done all complaint would cease As the act reads now the men who handle one million gallons of wine per year and retailers who buy from them and bottle 1t must pay the tax and in very incon- venient way. He expressed the opinion that this feature of the act was unconsti- tutional.
 Special Revenue Agent Burt M. Thomas said that wine drawn from a cask and served In pitcher or a tumbler was not taxable under the provisions of the act.