That the selling of such liquors be restrained to persons keeping public brandy-shops, victualling-houses, coffee-houses, ale-houses, innholders, and to such Surgeons and Apothecaries as shall make use of it by way of medicine only.[214]
The Government were at last in earnest: a bill was introduced, the intention of which was to strike a fatal blow, to annihilate the gin traffic. But the blow was too sudden. A rebound was almost inevitable. The Gin Act, which has rendered the year 1736 famous in the annals of history, was introduced into and carried through Parliament by Sir Joseph Jekyll. It runs thus:—
Whereas the excessive drinking of spirituous liquors by the common people tends not only to the destruction of their health and the debauching of their morals, but to the public ruin:
For remedy thereof—
Be it enacted, that from September 29th no person shall presume, by themselves or any others employed by them, to sell or retail any brandy, rum, arrack, usquebaugh, geneva, aqua vitæ, or any other distilled spirituous liquors, mixed or unmixed, in any less quantity than two gallons, without first taking out a licence for that purpose within ten days at least before they sell or retail the same; for which they shall pay down 50l., to be renewed ten days before the year expires, paying the like sum, and in case of neglect to forfeit 100l., such licenses to be taken out within the limits of the penny post at the chief office of Excise, London, and at the next office of Excise for the country. And be it enacted that for all such spirituous liquors as any retailers shall be possessed of on or after September 29th, 1736, there shall be paid a duty of 20s. per gallon, and so in proportion for a greater or lesser quantity above all other duties charged on the same.
The collecting the rates by this Act imposed to be under the management of the commissioners and officers of Excise by all the Excise laws now in force (except otherwise provided by this Act), and all moneys arising by the said duties or licenses for sale thereof shall be paid into the receipt of his Majesty’s Exchequer distinctly from other branches of the public revenue; one moiety of the fines, penalties, and forfeitures to be paid to his Majesty and successors, the other to the person who shall inform on any one for the same.
The Act was virtually prohibitive. But the people were too far gone to bear it. It was ineffectual to check even the progress of intemperance. The vices of the populace rendered them desperate. The Act, says Dr. Lees, produced vast excitement.
The populace of London, Bristol, Norwich, and other towns, honoured what they called the ‘death of Madame Gin’ with formal ‘funeral’ processions, whereat many of her devoted admirers, male and female, got ‘gloriously drunk.’ The distillers took out wine licences, offered gin—spiced and wined—for sale, under a new name; while drams were sold in the brandy-shops, under the quaint appellations of ‘Sangree,’ ‘Tom Row,’ ‘Cuckold’s Comfort,’ ‘Parliament Gin,’ ‘The Last Shift,’ ‘Ladies’ Delight,’ ‘King Theodore of Corsica,’ ‘Cholic-and-Gripe-Waters,’ &c. Lord Cholmondeley said, on the part of the Government, that the law exposed them to rebellion, and that they had information of its being designed; but by parading the troops in the dangerous locality, they had probably prevented riot and bloodshed. In March 1738 a proclamation was passed to enforce the Act and to protect the efforts of the officers of justice.
The consumption of spirits in England and Wales rose from 13,500,000 gallons in 1734, to 19,000,000 in 1742, and there were within the bills of mortality more than 20,000 houses and shops in which gin was sold by retail. As might be expected, informers became objects of popular hatred, and were hunted through the streets. Of course, the more respectable traffickers abandoned the proscribed business, which fell into the hands of reckless and disreputable men, who set at nought the provisions of the law. ‘Within two years of the passing of the Act,’ says the historian, though 12,000 persons had been convicted of offences against it, ‘it had become odious and contemptible;’ and policy, as well as humanity, forced the commissioners of excise to mitigate its penalties.