The Czar of Russia and the Use of Vodka in His Dominions
REFORMERS in Russia have been seeking for a number of years to suppress the manufacture and the use of vodka, realizing that it was menacing the morality and the prosperity of the nation. But the ministry of finance was invariably opposed to every such reform, because it tended to diminish one of its most lucrative sources of revenue. The czar has been making extensive personal observations, and he expresses "his deep regret at the melancholy spectacle of the people's helplessness and the family wretchedness, the inevitable results of inebriate life." And he further- more laid down the principle that "the prosperity of the state exchequer ought not to be made dependent upon the moral and material ruin of so many of my subjects." The government monopoly of spirits was introduced some twenty years ago by M. Witte; and so long as Count Witte remained at the head of the ministry of finance, the revenue from the monopoly never exceeded $250,000,000 a year. But during the last ten years, under the administration of M. Kokovtseff, the revenue from the vodka monopoly has nearly doubled. In 1912 it was $380,000,000, and in 1913 it was $415,000,000, and it is expected to reach $455,000,000 this year. Count Witte, who introduced the government monopoly of spirits, is one of the strongest advocates in favor of abolishing the evil. The national exchequer has been in a very flourishing condition during the last ten years, but Count Witte asks the question, "Is it merely that our successful budgets of the last decade should be based on the energetic and rapid fostering of the drink revenue?" Government officials have been very active in the villages, as well as the cities, in cultivating the drink habit, and all in order that they might derive a great revenue from the sale of intoxicants. This is one of the great characteristics of the drink evil. For the mere gain that there is in it, the purveyors of strong drink are willing to destroy human beings, both soul and body. We throw up our hands in horror at the cruelties and the barbarities of war, but what is there that brings greater suffering than this curse of the liquor traffic? It is to be hoped that the czar will be successful in the reforms he is seeking to bring about in his empire.