Evening star., 1934-01-10
Senators King and Capper
Favor Some Form of Gov
ernment Sale.
COMMITTEE TO START
HEARINGS TOMORROW
Majority Expected to Report Out
House Bill for District
Liquor Control.

When the Senate District Committee
meets tomorrow morning to act on the
District liquor control bill the vote
may be extremely close between advo-
Gates of the private license plan as
passed by the House yesterday and the
Government dispensaEy system.
Senator King, Democrat, of Utah,
chairman, and Senator Capper of
Kansas, ranking Republican member,
both favor some form Of Government
dispensary and they will have other
supporters on the committee. Because
several members have not made up
their minds definitely it is difficult to
predict what the outcome will be.
Indications today we're that there
probably will be a majority to report
out the private license bill, although it
is likely a margin of few votes will
determine the question.
Although the private license plan is
recommended by the committee there is
strong likelihood that it will be amended
in several particulars and scme of the
restrictions removed by the House
yesterday will be restored.
Senator Capper said there would be a
determined effort to substitute dis
pensary plan. Senator King said he
still prefers a dispensary system along
the general lines of the Quebec method
of confining hard liquor sales to Gov
ernment stores. Two other members
Of the committee, Senators Gore, Dem
ocrat, of Oklahoma, and BanKhead,
Democrat. of Alabama, are leaning
toward the dispensary idea, but have
not reached final conclusions as to an
exact method Of distribution.
Senator Couzens, Republican, of
Michigan, made known several weeks
ago that he preferred the Government
store plan for the sale Of bottled liquor
and wholesale distributions. confning
private licenses to hotels and res
taurants-
Senator Reynolds, Democrat. OF
North Carolina. favors private licenses
for retail sale, both in restaurants and
establishments selling In sealed pack
ages, but he will sound out committee
sentiment on his proposal that the Dis
trict Government act as the sole whole
sale distributor, to control quality and
price This same general idea is fav-
ored by Senator Carey, Republican, of
wyoming.
Senators Copeland of New York and
McCarran of Nevada prefer the private
license plan.
Senators Tydings, Maryland, and
Lewis, Illinois. said they had not studied
the pending bills sufficiently yet to say
which plan they would prefer. Several
remaining members of the committee
could not be reached today.
Beaten BY Narrow Margin.
After advocates Of the dispensary
plan in the House had been beaten by a
surprisingly small margin on two test
votes yesterday, that branch of Con-
gress proceeded rapidly to go through
the measure section by section for
amendments, with Chairman Norton Of
the House District Committee, in
charge of the bill
When the smoke had cleared and the
bill finally passed, a summary showed
the following essential changes that
were made on the floor during the day
The tax of 20 cents a gallon had
been removed from light wines of less
than IA per cent alcoholic content,
leaving light wines as well as beer free
from any local sales tax. The tax on
wines above IA per cent was changed
from so to 35 cents gallon, and
champagne was left at so cents gal
lon. No change was made in the local
tax Of so cents a gallon on whisky.
Fail to Confine Drinking.
The section prohibiting drinking in
public places, such as streets, alleys
parks or in vehicles, was stricken from
the bill
The ban against the display Of bottles
in restaurants was removed. The bill
allows restaurants. hotels and clubs to
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