were due to fraudulent practices, rather than to an impairment of ability to consume on the part of the masses.
(4) The average annual increase in the receipt of internal revenue from fermented liquors for the ten years from 1883 to 1892 was $1,306,057, and for the four years ending with the fiscal year 1893 about $1,617,000. That this latter ratio of annual increase under the present rate of tax is likely to indefinitely continue is almost demonstrated by the fact that the popularity of fermented or malt liquors as beverage among the American people is unquestionably increasing; and also that large, seemingly, as is their present average per capita consumption—namely, sixteen gallons—the present per capita consumption of the people of several other nationalities is much greater; that of the United Kingdom being estimated at thirty gallons; of England and Wales, thirty-six; of Belgium, forty; and of Germany, forty-five. An important fact pertinent to the prospective consumption of beer and its permanent value as a source of national revenue is, that the cost of the materials used in its manufacture has decreased in comparatively recent years, in the United States, Great Britain, and probably other countries characterized by its large consumption, to the extent of at least forty per cent; and the advantage from this change which has accrued to British brewers was stated by the British Chancellor of Exchequer, in May, 1895, to have been upward of £2,000,000 ($10,000,000) per annum. Another point of interest in this connection which is especially worthy of attention is, that if moral influences have ever materially affected the general consumption of distilled spirits or fermented liquors in the United States, the tabulated tax experiences of its Government, which constitute the only reliable basis for forming an opinion, do not afford any indication of it.
Having reformed and radically reduced the war taxes in the Department of Internal Revenue, it was next in order for Congress to consider the readjustment of the customs system of taxation, which had also been evolved, as it were, out of the war's fiscal exigencies; and it accordingly in 1867 instructed the Secretary of the Treasury to present at its next session the draft of a tariff embodying reductions of war rates. The responsibility of preparing such a draft having been next intrusted by the Secretary to the Special Commissioner of the Revenue, the latter, with a view of qualifying himself for the trust, visited Europe under a Government commission, and investigated under almost unprecedented advantages nearly every form of industry then competitive with the United States in Great Britain and on the Continent. The results of this visit and investigation effected an enlightenment on his part in respect to two salient and fundamental points:
