Swiss Drink Monopoly.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 192, 19 February 1887, Page 8

Swiss Drink Monopoly.

Xot long since England was reminded that she had accomplished the melancholy feat of having drunk herself out of deficits, if not out of debt. The Swiss people are now called upon to perform a much more wonderful feat ; they are to drink themselves sober ! Such, at all event?, eeems to be or.o of the objects proposed in the new law which confers on the State the monopoly of the production of alcohol. The distillers are to produco pure alcohol, and even the potato is in the list of substances not recognised as wholesome enough for the purpose. They are to furnish the alcohol at cost price to the State, and to be content with their profits from the refuse. The State or tho Confederation is to supply thi=! alcohol to "the tiado." One-fourrh of the net profit oi tbo monopoly id to be kept by the Federal Treasury : three-fourths aro to go to the treasuries of the cantons, these aro no longer to levy indirect; taxes on the trade ; and each canton is to prove to the Federal authority that it has employed "10 per cent, of its annual share of profit in the suppression of tho abuse of alcoholic liquors !" According to the estimates of the annual produco of the monopoly, £30,000 a year is to bo thus spent in making the Swiss sober ; but it can only be there to be spent it they first drink enough alcohol to raiee tcur millions a year of revenue.