The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1918-08-05

sumner. This being true, the liquor In
terests are merely tax collectors and
according to the plans as reported
from Washington, the house. w4y0
and means committee would Charge
these interests with the respongih1hty
OF collecting nine hundred million dol
lars from the public. In order to- COLI
lect this money the brewers would be
allowed to continue the waste Of A0.-
Geo. 900 bushels of grain, of hundreds
of thousands of tons. of coal. would
be permitted to continue interfering
with transportation and to carry ION
their campaign of weakening the
man power of the nation. They would
not be required to hand over to the
government a reasonable percentAga
of the amount they collect.
Under the old regime, before tho
LIQUOR tax was increased. people OF tha
nation handed the liquor makers and
sellers something over two billion dot
lars a year for booze. With the. In
creased tax the price was raised and
the annual amount spent for liquor u
probably increased. Now, with .anbfh-
err raise of taxes, it is a conservative
estimate to say that the consumers
would be required to pay at least- dou-
bic the former amount, bringing the
amount paid for booze up to at least
four billion dollars, assuming that the
consumers would continue to btTya in
spite of the increased price. nine Yit1n-
dred millions of which would ge to tho
government as the booze sellers con-
tributton to the war chest. The loss
OF grain and coal and waste OF man
power Is not included in this estimate.
I Sixry-two per cent OF the populattou
of the United States settled this reve-
nue. question when they abolished fl0
liquor traffic in 80 per cent Of tbs ma
tons territory.
Does any thinking man believe that
people can squander this Tremendous
amount of money upon Commodity
which is worse than useless and still
be in good financial position t6 pur-
chase liberty bonds. war savings
charities? Is
Cases of alcoholism have heen re- 81
duced to less than one-third nv New
York city. as indicated by records. az
the Bellevue hospital, DIR. JeWett head
or the psychopathic ward attributes
this decrease to the fact that nov the
people are saving their money ~ buy
ing liberty bonds and war -sariars
stamps They cannot buy both books
ana noerty bonds. Patriotisms ana
pr0habiiion go hand In hand t.ass
Is the mildewed old argument, Of wore.
Is answered in this one statement that
the proposed nine hundred million dol
lars revenue comes from the. pockets
OF the people, who will be ursf,a I,lv
naulcted of four billion dolIwrex il
money spent directly for boozn md
the collecting agency. the liauohs trait
nc would during the year wastes forty
million bushels of grain, hundreds ofs
thousands OF tons OF coal andHnnar1ci- 4
tate tens of thousands of men for do
ing their full share OF war work.
from a financial standpndfsN doe
.his KIND of policy s,9tAsku4nv
school boy r8sr g ~
urge your congressman. 4an4ot ~ ss
.ors not to be misled by thix Hilary 0fd
lesenue argument of the iiqGor m n NJ
ss1s, out to vote for wartimaa Arohfbf~
INN INN ana thereby save the ge%erff1 mt I
billions OF dollars OF nonas- 49, ..s ss
serve the resources of the nattSn Mt I
20 the winning of the war. 's