Liquor Laws and Liquor Control

Germany.

Before the war the German law and practice was similar to that in France, some restriction through taxation, heaviest on spirituous liquors, and a licence system slightly restrictive as to spirits left largely in the hands of the provincial and local authorities. The law in the various States varied greatly. War-time restrictions, amounting to partial prohibition for food conservation, were severe and were both general and local. The new Constitution of the German Republic gives a right of initia tive by to% of the voters which was expected to provide a local veto on the liquor question. Voluntary polls in various parts of the country seemed to indicate a trend toward greater restric tion and prohibition. The Reichstag passed an act in 1923 pro hibiting the sale of absinthe, and a local option measure requir ing a two-thirds vote in any community for no licence. In 1925 the Reichstag defeated by a vote of 200 to 168 a measure pro viding stringent regulations for saloons, and in May 1927 rejected a wider local option bill by 241 to 163 votes.

Austria-Hungary.

Prior to the war licence policies similar to those in Germany prevailed but the licence fee was graduated as in Prussia in accordance with the population of the place. Severe police regulations were applied to restrict excesses of spirit drinking.

Poland.

In 1921 a law was passed introducing the local option feature, and in 1924 a Government monopoly of the liquor trade was established which assumed the entire control of the manufacture and sale of spirits.

Italy.

In 1913 the manufacture and importation of absinthe was prohibited, and a law enacted requiring special permits for the sale of spirits and liquors. Since the World War under the strong centralized Government of the Fascists both legislation and executive orders have attempted to reduce the number of licences for the sale of intoxicants to one for each thousand popu lation and to limit more strictly the hours of sale, etc., also to divert the large grape industry to other uses than wine production.

Holland.

The number of licensed spirit retailers before the war was limited in proportion to population, 1 to Soo, and the taxation, which was both national and local ranged from o% to 25% of the annual value. The internal revenue tax on spirits was increased iso% and on beer i 00% in 1920 and a local option bill came within one vote of passage.

manufacture and wholesale sale of spirits has been a State monopoly since 1887. Retailing is a licensed trade as elsewhere and there are many changes and variations in the strictness of local regulations. In June 1923 a referen dum in the interest of prohibition, calling for an extension of the State liquor monopoly and placing a big import duty on all foreign liquors, resulted in the rejection of the measure at the polls by a vote of 352,772 to 259,741. Another referendum vote was taken May 11, 1929, on local option for the cantons and the communes, on manufacture and sale of spirituous liquors. Though the Federal Assembly recommended the rejection of the proposal, fearing the loss of $300,000 annual revenue derived from the tax ation of alcohol, it was said the measure would have carried de spite the government if Swiss women had the vote, but it was re jected by a large majority ; but a referendum (Apr. 6, 1930) to extend the powers of the government alcohol monopoly was car ried by 172,000 majority in 800,000 votes cast.

Russia.

In 1895 Russia began to convert the previously exist ing licensing system into a State monopoly which was gradually ex tended to the whole country. The object was to check the excess of spirit drinking and the result was a very large reduction in the number of liquor shops which extended also to the licensed beer-houses though the latter were not directly affected as such but it did not check heavy vodka consumption. The Russian monopoly was extended during the war so as to amount to total prohibition which was continued under the Soviet regime until 1921 when the sale of wine in limited quantities was authorized and the sale of beer was permitted without limitation. In

the Soviet Executive Council permitted again the sale of vodka but attempted its restriction by a card system of control through the agencies of the State spirit monopoly. The Soviet Government derives a huge revenue, said to amount to 500 million dollars a year from the taxation of alcohol and the liquor trade.

Finland and Estonia.

The early Russian prohibition of vodka and war-time restrictions on alcoholic beverages applied to both countries. Estonia repealed war-time prohibition in 2920 for liquor control similar to the "Bratt" system of Sweden.

Finland has been an autonomous but not a sovereign state since 1809 when she was separated from Sweden and joined to Russia. The Finnish Diet was competent to legislate but its enactments required promulgation by the government of the Tsar. The Diet passed (1907) a prohibition bill which failed in the Senate. In 1909 a bill passed Diet and Senate but failed to secure the Tsar's approval. Similar bills passed by the new unicameral Parliament failed to secure promulgation by the Emperor in 1911 and 1914. Finland declared her independence in December 1917, and in July 1919, her Parliament passed a new prohibition law which revised and strengthened the Act of 1909 re-enacted in 1917. This Act prohibited the import, manufacture, transport, sale and storage of all alcoholic beverages of over 2% alcoholic content, except for medicinal and scientific purposes, for which the State re served the sole right to provide, applied to spirits, wines and beers alike, and provided severe graded penalties of fines ac cording to income of the offender, and jail sentences for its violation. The penalties were increased by an Act of June 1922 (No. 158). Great difficulties were encountered in the enforce ment of this law against liquor smugglers and the economic pressure of wine-growing countries such as France and Spain. Serious abuses arose through medical prescriptions and diversion of alcohol for medical, industrial and scientific purposes to illegal uses. Finland took the lead in an international conference which assembled at Helsingfors, November 24 to December 4, 1924, and resulted in an international treaty for the repression of smuggling of alcohol, adopted by the Baltic States and Norway in August 1925, and ratified subsequently by the Parliaments of Finland, Sweden and Norway, Germany and most of the other signatories. At the Seventh Assembly of the League of Nations in 1926 the delegations of Finland, Poland and Sweden made an appeal to the League and the Eighth Assembly in 1927 discussed the advisa bility of the impartial scientific research and examination of the question of combating the dangers of alcoholism and of deal ing with the importation and consumption of liquor in mandated territories and of smuggling of alcoholic liquor on frontiers of all countries and especially on the seas. The Ninth Assembly (1928) decided to ask the Council to request the Health Organiza tion and the Economic Committee of the League to investigate the problems indicated. Their reports were inconclusive and nothing came of this effort. (John H. Wuorinen, The Prohibition Experi ment in Finland, N.Y. 1931.) The Finnish Diet on February 28, 1928, passed by a large majority several amendments to the pro hibition law, making its enforcement more rigorous and increasing the control of the government over the right of physicians to prescribe wines and spirits for medicinal purposes. The diffi culties of enforcement, with smuggling and bootlegging, con tinued. Opposition was accentuated by the crime and tax situation and repeal proceeded along the same lines as in the United States (see Prohibition).