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keeping within the strict letter of the law. It was
hoped in. this way to furnish a drink which looked
like beer and tasted like beer but was practically
devoid of alcohol. People drank it for a while,
wagged their heads and went away in silence and
sorrow, (doom was deep upon the people. There
was the voice of one crying in the nitrht. There was
weeping and wailing, and the weepers would not be
comforted, because of whiskey there was none,
brandy could not be had. and the beer was a snare
and a delusion. “ Woe, woe is me” was in the
hearts and on the lips of the majority of the people.
Finally, a ray of light filtered through and Geor
gia once more began to “sit up and take notice.”
The Court of Appeals of the state decided that the
prohibition law. as passed, had failed to stipulate
how much or how little alcohol there might be in
the prohibition beverages: it merely stated that it
must be an amount which would not be sufficient to
intoxicate when drunk to excess. Brewers and many
of the most prominent and influential temperance
workers have always contended that beer is not an
intoxicating beverage, but in order to be on the safe
side and to keep within the strict limits of the law,
the brewers of Georgia decided to place upon the
market a malt liquor containing from l'<> to 2 per
cent of alcohol instead of from 3 1 o to 4 per cent,
as was usual.
The way in which the public welcomed this drink
would have been laughable, had it not have been so
pitiful. “It looks like beer, it tastes like beer, and,
by the Eternal. 1 believe it is beer.” many were heard
to say. In fact, there were comparatively few who
could tell the difference in taste, and only the man
who tried to make a hog of himself by drinking
thirty or forty bottles was able to tell the differ
ence in the effects. Thousands of people who would
never have permitted a case of standard beer to be
brought into their houses under any circumstances
now keep the prohibition beer in their homes, per
mit their children to drink it. and recommend it to
their friends as a healthful and non-intoxicating
beverage.
Some idea of the vogue which this drink has
obtained among the people can be gained from the
fact that formerly the Savannah Brewing Company
sold the entire output of its brewery in one county,
but now they sell the DA per cent beverage not only
all over the State of Georgia, but ship it by the car
load to Florida. Alabama and Tennessee.
The Macon brewery, which started by putting
out a beverage containing .(IO 1 per cent alcohol,
which they called “Acme Brew.” has now ceased to
manufacture this drink, and is doing an enormous
business on their “Maltale,” containing PA per
cent alcohol.
The Atlanta brewery is keeping pace with the
procession, and their “Bud." containing 1.75 per
cent alcohol, is on sale at every drug store, soda
water fountain and fruit stand in northwest Georgia.
The Augusta brewery for a time placed on the
market a malt beverage containing .OOIA per cent of
alcohol, which they called “Belle of Georgia,” but
since the decision of the Court of Appeals they have
been offering for sale “Augusta Brew.” containing
1.90 per cent alcohol. The Augusta brewery is still
experimenting, and within a week or two expect to
have the percentage of alcohol in their “Augusta
Brew" reduced to 1 1 j per cent. The “Georgia
THE REASON
Home Beer.” manufactured by the Savannah Brew
ing Company, which has achieved the largest degree
of popularity, due to the fact that it has been on
the market longest, contains 1.66 per cent of alcohol.
The Macon, Atlanta and Augusta breweries care
fully refrain from the use of the word “beer” in
connection with their non-intoxicating malt bever
ages, feeling that the word beer might act upon the
extremists as a red flag does to a bull: but the
Savannah brewers take the stand that while the
drink which they manufacture is not intoxicating,
even when drunk to excess, it is in all other respects
identical with the beer which they brewed prior to
January Ist. and hence it is a beer and should be
called beer.
Appreciating the enormous demand for soft
drinks, all of the brewers in Georgia have enlarged
their bottling works, and are manufacturing soda
waters, ginger-ale, sarsaparilla, etc., on a large scale.
The public, realizing that the brewers have unusual
facilities, have given the preference to their products
whenever they were procurable. So profitable has
this branch of the business become that Air. Abe S.
Guckenheimer. president of the Savannah Brewing
Company, told the writer a few days ago that even
in the event of the repeal of the prohibition law, the
Savannah Brewing Company would continue to man
ufacture soft drinks and their 1 1 A> per cent beer.
The Georgia brewers are not without competition
in the manufacture of “near-beers.” by any means.
Brewers outside the state were quick to note the
demand for malt beverages containing a small per
centage of alcohol, and carload after carload was
shipped into the state from Montgomery, Chatta
nooga. Richmond, Evansville. St. Louis and Alilwau
kee. On all of this the labels declared that the bev
erage in the bottle contained less than 2 per cent of
alcohol, but in many cases it has been found that it
was a standard grade of beer, containing the usual
percentage of alcohol, the only difference being in
the label.
During these trying times the man who feels
that he needs a drink occasionally has had to do
without unless he was fortunate in having a friend
who possessed sufficient foresight to order his hard*
liquor in the original package from Chattanooga,
Jacksonville or Montgomery.
In the report of the committee of fifty, there ap
pears the following: “There have been coneommit
ant evils of prohibitory legislation. The efforts to
enforce it during forty years past have had some
unlooked-for effects on public respect for courts,
judicial procedure, oaths and law in general, and for
officers of the law. legislators and/ public servants.
'The public have seen law defied, a whole generation
of habitual law-breakers schooled in evasion and
shamelessness, courts ineffective through fluctuations
of policy, delays, perjuries, negligences, and other
miscarriages of justice, officers of the law double
faced and mercenary, legislators timid and insincere,
candidates for office hypocritical and truckling, and
office-holders unfaithful to pledges and to reasona
ble public expectation.”
The Reverend Dr. AV. N. Ainsworth of Savannah,
one of the leading prohibition workers and lecturers
of the state, has already from his pulpit and in the
public prints, made the accusation that the juries
who returned verdicts of “not guilty” in several
“blind-tiger" cases had perjured themselves bv so