In considering the effects of the Gothenburg system on the lives of the people, these two things must be borne in mind: First, the system only touches the trade in spirits, and has nothing to do with the sale of beer. This latter is almost free, and has been rather encouraged by the authorities than otherwise, under the mistaken notion that it would lessen the demand for stronger drink. Of wine and beer shops, licensed for consumption on the premises, there are 128, besides an unlimited number for consumption off the premises, requiring no licences. A large amount of the drunkenness in Gothenburg is caused by these beer shops. The police there ascertain, when a person is arrested for drunkenness, where he obtained his liquor; and from their returns it can be seen that the intoxication produced by beer is steadily increasing. In 1875 the number of persons arrested who drank last at beer saloons was 130; by 1885 the number had increased to 483; and in 1889 the number was 753.

A second important consideration in estimating the results of the system is the fact that even the whole trade in spirits is not in the hands of the company. There are seventeen restaurants, licensed by permission of the company, and managed by private individuals, which sell intoxicants. There are also five public-houses whose owners have the ancient right of carrying on the business, and with whom the company cannot interfere. Last of all, there are twenty-three wine merchants, who take out expensive licences from the company, for the sale of spirits off the premises.

Whatever deductions are drawn from the condition of the town as to the results of the system, considerable allowance must be made for the fact that the whole of the liquor traffic is not conducted by the company. Perhaps the most outstanding evidence in favour of the system is this, that, not only are the people of the place well satisfied with it, but seventy-six other towns in Sweden have been led by it to adopt the same plan, and only thirteen places still retain the old method of selling the licences to private bidders. In Norway, too, the spirit trade is now conducted in nearly every town in substantially a similar way.

In discussing the effects of any liquor law it is never an easy task to decide how far social changes or effects are the cause of it, or how far they are due to other and entirely different economic causes. Immediately after the establishment of the company there was a great decrease in the consumption of drink and its attendant evils in Gothenburg; but this was due quite as much to the depression of trade as to anything else. Afterwards there was an increase of drinking, for trade greatly improved. It would be inaccurate either to wholly lay the cause of the decrease to the credit of the company or to blame it for the increase.

The following returns show the amount of drunkenness in Gothenburg during a few selected years:—

Arrests for Drunkenness.
Year.Population. Total.Percentage.
185544,804 343113·8
186545,750 20704·5
187559,986 24904·2
188584,450 24752·9
1891104,215 46244·4
1892106,356 45634·3

It is not possible to give any reliable returns as to the amount of spirits consumed in Gothenburg. The sales of the company only represent part of the total quantity sold in the place, and all that the company sells is not consumed there. Much of it is bought by country people, who take it back with them to their own homes. The returns of the company show a fairly steady decrease. Thus in 1874-5 the total sales amounted to 29 quarts per head; in 1884-5, 19·1 quarts; and in 1891-2, only 14·3 quarts.

Financially, the company has from the first been a great success. It need not have ever called up a penny of its capital, had not the law required this to be done; and every year it has been able to hand over a very large surplus to the town, to be used for public purposes. In 1892 (the last year for which, at the time of writing, returns are available) the amounts paid to the city treasury were: (1) fixed fee for bar trade and retail licences, £15,632; (2) surplus profits, after paying all expenses, £21,868, or a total of £37,500. This amounted to the equivalent of over 7s. a head for every man, woman and child in the place. Formerly the city retained the whole of the surplus profits for its own benefit; but this created considerable dissatisfaction, and at last an alteration was made by which the municipality now only receives seven-tenths, the national treasury appropriating two-tenths, and the remaining tenth going to the country districts.

In Gothenburg the whole of the amount received by the municipality goes for the relief of local taxation. This has been felt by many to embody a dangerous principle, as giving the city authorities a direct interest in the encouragement of drinking. To avoid this, the plan has been adopted in Norway of devoting the surplus, not to relieving the rates, but to helping charitable and philanthropic non-rate-aided enterprises.

The most notable example of the Norwegian plan is the town of Bergen. A liquor company was formed here in 1876, at the suggestion of the local magistracy, and it commenced business at the beginning of 1877. Not only is the distribution of profits here different, but the management of the houses varies too. In Gothenburg the aim has been to make the dram shops comfortable and attractive; in Bergen, on the contrary, the aim has apparently been to render them as uncomfortable and as repulsive as possible. Each house consists solely of a bar for the sale of liquor; nothing but liquor is sold, and when a person has consumed what he ordered he must go. No seats are provided, and customers are forbidden to loiter about the premises. This sternly repressive policy does not seem to have had a remarkable effect on the consumption of spirits; for whereas in 1877 the average sales per head came to 7·1 quarts, they were only reduced to 6·1 quarts in 1891; and this notwithstanding the fact that the average consumption for the whole of the country had been reduced in the same time from 6·3 quarts to 3·3 quarts. The number of arrests for drunkenness in Bergen in 1877 and 1891 was about the same; but a largely increased population in the latter year makes this show that the proportionate intoxication was really less. From the time of its commencement up to 1890, the Bergen company was able to distribute £69,731 among local philanthropic societies, and the recipients of its bounty have included all kinds of works for the common weal, museums, training ships, hospitals, a rescue society, orphanages, a tree-planting society, a fund for sea baths for the poor, temperance organisations, and the like. The profits which would otherwise have gone to enrich a few have thus been scattered about doing good to the many.