Now, compare these figures with the saloon traffic in liquors. In this
city, the capital of the State, there were, in January, 1885, seventy
saloons. It has been ascertained, by the most careful and accurate
investigation, that the expenses of saloons for rent, fuel, lights, city
license, taxes, lawyers’ fees, help, liquors, etc., cannot average less
than $20 per day. The expenses of some, of course, do not exceed $5 or
$10 per day, but those of others reach $30 to $50 per day; so that $20
is a fair average. Hence, the seventy saloons open in Topeka until
January, 1885, must have received an aggregate of $1,400 per day to
cover their expenses, or, allowing 10 per cent. for profit, $1,540 per
day. And as the saloon, where it exists, is open 365 days in the year,
the seventy saloons of the city of Topeka, in order to meet their
expenses and realize a profit of 10 per cent., must have received the
enormous sum of $562,100 per annum. In other words, the 23,490 people of
the city of Topeka then expended in the saloons more than two-thirds as
much money for alcoholic liquors as all the people of the State of
Kansas now expend in the drug stores for the same purpose.
Let me make the comparison still more plain. There were, in Topeka,
seventy saloons, which would be one for every 335 of its then
inhabitants. A like ratio for the State would give Kansas, with its
1,500,000 inhabitants, 4,477 saloons. The expenses of these, at $20 per
day, and 10 per cent. profit, would aggregate the enormous sum of
$35,950,310 per year. In other words, while the sales of liquor in
Kansas by the druggists now aggregate only $837,200 per annum, if we had
in Kansas as many saloons in proportion to population as had this city
from 1881 to 1885, their sales, in order to meet their daily expenses,
must aggregate $98,494 per day, or $35,950,310 per annum—$35,113,110
more than the sales by the druggists now aggregate.
A still more startling comparison is afforded by the statistics of the
saloon business of Leavenworth. There are, it is reported, 230 saloons
in that city, or one for every 127 of its 29,268 inhabitants. To meet
the expenses of these saloons, estimating them at an average of only $15
per day each, requires receipts aggregating $3,450 per day, or
$1,259,250 per annum—$422,250 more than is received by all the druggists
of Kansas for all the liquors they sell. A like ratio for the whole
State would give Kansas 11,811 saloons, whose daily expenses, at $15 per
day, would aggregate the enormous sum of $177,165 per day, or
$64,665,225 per year—just $63,828,225 more than the sales by the
druggists now aggregate.