view raw text
TAXATION AND PROHIBITION Mr Kitchin chairman of the Ways and Means Committee of the House is calmly walking over the fanatical drys who were so hot to throw away revenue for the sake of forcing their unappearable idol of prohibition upon the country during the war He waves aside as any man or economist of sense ought the amendment to the food stimulation bill that makes the United States dry next January Senator Simmons chairman of the Senate Appro ¬ priations Committee has vainly told the zealots that the treasury Avill lose an immense revenue if the drys have their way wayMr Mr Kitchiu accepting some of the suggestions made by the Treasury Department last week in regard to the taxation of luxuries proposes in his first draft of the revenue bill to double existing taxes on alcoholic beverages In place of the present 450000000 a year these taxes would bring in 900000000 a year nearly oneeighth of the 8000 000000 to be raised by the bill billThere There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth among the statesmen to whom beer is the sum of all evils and prohibition the one thing needful and the linchpin of the world Yet it would be hard to make a more preposterous proposal than wantonly to toss away nearly a billion of revenue easily col ¬ lected for the sake of hammering a fixed idea into the statute books New York Times
