9. The trade of a publican is looked upon as a peculiar privilege. The hope of obtaining a licence increases beer-shops.
10. It seems desirable that a higher rate of duty be paid for a licence, and more stringent regulations enforced as to character and sureties.
11. Statistics of intemperance defective. The evidence before the Committee is sufficient to show that the amount of drunkenness is very much greater than appears upon the face of any official returns.
12. There are many places where beer is sold without a licence. Some of them, under cover of the law permitting beer at 1½d. a quart to be sold without licence, sell also porter and ale (6882). ‘At the single town of Fazeley there are about 30 houses that sell porter, ale, and beer indiscriminately; they are private houses, known as “Bush-houses,” from their having a bush over the door as a sign to their frequenters’ (4838, 6840). At Oldham ‘there are from 400 to 500 such places, known there as Hush-shops, where they brew their own beer, and have each their own known customers.’ At Bolton, at Preston, and in Hampshire and London, similar practices are more or less prevalent (3664, 3679).
13. ‘The temptation is strong to encourage intemperance, and a vast number of the houses for the sale of intoxicating drinks live upon drunkards and the sure progress of multitudes to drunkenness.’
14. ‘Your Committee do not feel it necessary to follow the evidence upon the connection of intoxicating drinks with crime; it has, directly or indirectly, been the subject of inquiry at different times, and has been reported upon by numerous committees of your Honourable House, who bear unvarying testimony both to the general intemperance of criminals, and the increase and diminution of crime in direct ratio with the increased or diminished consumption of intoxicating drinks.... The entire evidence tends to establish that it is essential that the sale of intoxicating drinks shall be under strict supervision and control.’
15. ‘The testimony is universal that the greatest amount of drinking takes place on Saturday night, and during the hours that the houses are allowed by law to be open on Sunday.’
16. ‘It need not be matter of surprise that in view of the vast mass of evils found in connection with intemperance, it should have been suggested altogether to prohibit the manufacture and sale of intoxicating drinks. Laws to that effect are in force in the States of Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Michigan, in the United States; and your Committee have had before them several zealous promoters of an Association established to procure the enactment of similar laws in England.’[234]
On July 13, 1854, Colonel Wilson Patten strove to give effect to the provisions of the Villiers Committee. His Bill, known as the ‘Sunday Beer Act,’ was ‘A Bill for further regulating the sale of beer and other liquors on the Lord’s day.’
This Act closed public-houses and beer-shops on Sunday, from half-past two o’clock p.m. until six p.m., and from ten o’clock on Sunday evening until four a.m. on Monday. During the few months of its operating, there was a sensible abatement of drunkenness and disorder, as is testified by the returns from the police, throughout the country. We cite places by way of specimen. Warrington: ‘A most remarkable difference is observable in the general order which prevails throughout the town, as well as by the discontinuance of fearful affrays, and riotous conduct.’ Liverpool: ‘The new Act,’ says Mr. Greig, head constable of the police, ‘has been attended with the most beneficial results.’ London: Mr. G. A’Beckett, magistrate of the Southwark Police Court, in a letter to the Times, Jan. 8, 1855, says, ‘that on the Monday mornings before the Act, the business of the court was greater than on any other days, but that since, it had only averaged two cases of drunkenness for each Sunday.’ In 1855, the Wilson Patten Act was superseded by the New Beer Bill of Mr. Henry Berkeley, which extended the hour of closing to eleven at night, and gave a little more freedom to the traffic on the Sunday afternoon. The history of this remarkable piece of legislation is worth preserving, as a monument of its author’s—character. In a speech delivered by him, at the second anniversary dinner of the Licensed Victuallers’ Association, Bristol, reported in the Bristol Mercury, of Nov. 4, 1854, he said, that after Wilson Patten’s Bill had passed the second reading, he had been waited on by a deputation, but that being the ‘eleventh hour,’ no successful opposition could then be offered. He believed the words he used to the deputation were, ‘If nobody else comes forward I will have a shy at it.’ This it will be seen, was just before the Bill became law, and, therefore, before it had gone into effect. Mr. Berkeley opposed it without trial, and stood pledged against it without regard to its results. On Feb. 20, 1855, immediately after the meeting of Parliament, Mr. Berkeley, in his place in Parliament, inquired of the Government, whether they intended to do anything in reference to the Act, and received a reply that it was not their intention to repeal it. Mr. Berkeley then recommended the appointment of a select committee. This created considerable division among the publicans, who held many meetings for discussion, at all of which Mr. Berkeley was recognised as ‘their experienced and talented adviser.’ (See the Daily News, April and May, 1855, and The Era of April 22.) On April 23 a meeting of delegates is reported, in The Era of the 29th, to have been held in Mr. Painter’s public-house, Bridge Street, Westminster, which resulted in the appointment of a deputation to consult with Mr. Berkeley. The deputation is reported to have waited on Mr. Berkeley in the lobby of the House of Commons. ‘A long desultory conversation ensued, after which Mr. Berkeley advised the delegates to confer among themselves, and to consider well the course which would be most beneficial for them to pursue. He would postpone for a week his motion for a Select Committee.... Eventually his advice was accepted, and on June 26, 1855, his motion for a Select Committee was agreed to by the House—Mr. Cobbett, the seconder, remarking that no legislation could be attempted that session.[235]