It is a curious incident that in the taxation of alcoholic beverages, for the purpose of raising revenues to pay the expenses of the Government, wines in general have been to within a short time exempt from tax. The tariff law of 1915 places a tax of a few cents per gallon on wine. The law of October 3, 1917, doubles the tax on all still wines as well as champagnes and sparkling wines. Although the wines contain from two to four times as much alcohol as beer, they are not subject to the Internal Revenue tax except as stated above unless fortified.

In the early history of the country a tax was laid on wine. When Thomas Jefferson was President of the United States he was an advocate of the revocation or abolition of the duty on wine, and his views are expressed in the following language.

I rejoice, as a moralist, at the prospect of a reduction of the duties on wine by our National Legislature. It is an error to view a tax on that liquor as merely a tax on the rich. It is prohibition of its use to the middling classes of our citizens, and a condemnation of them to the poison of spirits, which is desolating their homes. No nation is drunken where wine is cheap; and none sober where the dearness of wine substitutes ardent spirits as its common beverage.