It was the outbreak of the Civil War that brought about the financial exigencies which resulted in the adoption of excise measures more favorable to the production of the lighter beverages. To raise a revenue sufficient to save the government from the disasters which threatened required heroic measures. What was required was money, and, as the result, the in ternal revenue laws were created. As these threw burdens of taxation chiefly upon the manufacturers of ardent spirits, the industry of brewing took a new lease of life, and the effect of the passage of these laws, in July 1862, may be seen in the development of the industry even up to the present day.
It was in 1862, at the moment when it was seen that there was to be an opportunity for the advancement of the brewing industry, that the Brewers' Association was formed. While this organization owed its existence partly to selfish interests, to the desire for self protectiOn and the better advancement of the trade, its fundamental purpose was a more patriotic one, its members binding themselves together to aid the government in the perfec tion of the revenue laws so far as they applied to the manufacture of malt liquors, and to as sist by their influence in the collection of such revenues, as well as to secure themselves against the possibility of unjust discrimination. Thus, from the beginning of its history, the Brewers' Association has remained true to its traditions, and, when the throes of the great struggle for national unity had ended, it still continued to co-operate with the government in all matters relating to the internal revenue. When we remember the meagre 2,000,000 gallons of malt liquors that were produced in the United States in 1795, the following table of statistics indi cates the steady development of this industry during the past century more eloquently than any words of mine could picture it : Whereas, in 1810, there were but 129 brew eries in the United States, there were 1,959 such establishments in 1899, ranging in output from about 1,000 barrels annually, to the enor mous beer manufactories with an individual output of more than 1,500,000 barrels per an num.
Since 1899, the number of breweries steadily decreased, partly through prohibition enact ments, partly through the combination of smaller plants or companies into larger organ izations, leading to the dismantling of the smaller or less efficiently equipped plants, and also to the erection of new plants, to take over the combined output of the individual units.
Thus, in 1910, the number of breweries had declined to 1,568; down to 1915 there was a further decline, the number of breweries ac cording to the Internal Revenue Report being 1,345. On 1 Jan. 1916, six more States were added to the prohibition column, with a total number of breweries of 62, increased by Vir ginia's six after 1 Nov. 1916, so that the num ber of breweries operating at the close of 1916 had been reduced to to which must be added the breweries of Michigan in 1918 and Montana in 1919, there now being 26 States in which State-wide prohibition has been adopted. In 1917 Congress decreed that a con stitutional amendment be submitted to the States providing for the abolishment of the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages, to be ratified within six years. It takes a two-thirds majority of each of the two houses of the legislature of a State to ratify, and requires three-fourths of the States to pass the amend ment.
The beer production in the United States showed a marked increase during the last 20 years and up to 1914, the output nearly doubling during that time. During the fiscal year 1914 to 1915 there was a decrease of over 6,000,000 barrels, but during the year ending June 1916, notwithstanding the closing of 62 breweries in six more prohibition States, the output of beer was 58,565,532, or approximately that of 1915, and 20,000,000 barrels higher than 20 years ago.
The breweries put out of commission in prohibition States are operating their plants as best they can by producing ((near-beers° or beverages intended to resemble beer as closely as possible but containing less than one-half of 1 per cent of alcohol, which may be sold without a tax and are exempted likewise from the payment of special taxes by dealers in malt liquors. The law does not prohibit the driving off of alcohol from a fermented bever age in the brewery, according to latest rulings of the Internal Revenue Department.
The following was written at a time when the prohibition movement had not yet developed a momentum that made the future of the in dustry problematical.