Albuquerque evening citizen. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1905-1907, 1906-02-27
DENATURIzED
ETHYL ALCOHOL
Bill Before Congress to
Remove Revenue TaA
on Production.
IS USED IN MANUFACTURES
Countries Where Free Lead
in Many Useful Articles
OF Commerce.
STANDARD OIL OPPOSES THE BILL

Washington, d. c., Feb. 27.-Farm
ers, manufacturers, capitalists, TEN
perance workers, preachers, moon
sinners, tariff experts and the Stand
ard Oil trust are equally interested in
a legislative proposition which is
fathered by Representative Thos. f.
Marshall of North Dakota.
Even the plain, everyday voter may
he said to have an interest in Mar
shalls bill, because it involves the
establishment of hundreds of new in
dustries in the United States, which
are flourishing abroad--and would be
here except for the secret antagonism
. of the Standard Oil trust.
Marshalls bill moves to take the
internal revenue tax from "denatural-
lied" alcohol.
Denaturallzed" alcohol is alcohol
wi;l a dash of poison added, so as
to render it unfit to drink AT pres
ent alcohol pays an internal revenue
tax of $2.07 a gallon. This makes the
product exceedingly expensive, and
vastly increases the cost of many ar
Ticles into the manufacture of which
alcohol enters.
If the duty on alcohol were removed
it could be sold for or IL cents a
gallon, or even less. There is scarcely
any article used SO universally in the
arts which can be produced so
cheaply.
But alcohol at 10 cents a gallon
would become a fuel and an illumin-
ant-and that is where it strikes al
the Standard Oil
The removal of the duty would cut
the revenues of Standard Oil by mill
ions of dollars. Automobiles, thresh-
ing machines, steam plows, and all
the machines using gasoline, naptf -
kerosene and other fuels would use
alcohol, as they have begun to do in
Germany, France, Belgium and other
countries, where this article is mo-
taxed.
The farmer has direct and vita
interest in the removal of the tal
from alcohol used in the arts, because
the greatly increased production o
alcohol would be manufactured from
potatoes, sugar beets and corn. The
pulp from the sugar beets which have
given up their sugar Ncould be made
to yield alcohol, and will still be gooC
as feed for cattle.
Free alcohol would Immediately re-
Sut in the establishment of a great
number of distilling plants in the
middle west north and south, and IL
the far western states, where the
sugar beet grows.
Temperance workers and preachers
are interested in the Marshall bill be-
cause it has been represented to then
that alcoholic beverages will be made
cheaper by this legislation. They
have been told that this cheap de
naturalized" alcohol can be reclaim
ed'-that is, have the poison worked
out of it-and be used as a beverage
If this were true, the temperance
people and preachers would do wei
TO fight the bill; but it happens tina
there is no truth in the report, a:
DR.. Wiley, of the government depart
ment of chemistry, will testify, anC
as the experience of all foreign coun
tries conclusively proves.
The Standard Oil company is re-
sponsible for the agitation among thu
temperance people. Not being able t.
fight the bill in the open, they hav'
taken steps to get out a great quan
tity of misguiding literature, calcu
lated to arouse the prejudice of thou
sands of unsuspecting peore. Tn
literature is going out from Pittsburg
Pa, and most of it bears the name o
a man who signs himself as an eX
president of some temperance organ
iZatiOn