DBQ- Gin Act of 1751 Essay

In mid-eighteenth century England, Parliament passed the trap make believe of 1751, which restricted the sale of gin through increased retail permit requirements and higher taxes on such liquor. This measure was enacted to slenderise the consumption of animate and the subsequent crime it engendered. Indeed, gin production increased nearly vitamin D% from 1701 to 1751. However, the general populace became engaged in a fierce look at for and once morest the new legislation. While references, artists, and religious leaders argued for the act, economists, businessmen, and landowners argued against it with equal fervor. Meanwhile, politicians were torn amongst themselves everywhere the situation at hand. Each group held the position it did for either inseparable or extrinsic reasons, usually but not always to advert their own best interests.Authors, artists, religious leaders, and certain politicians all supported the noose Act of 1751, but each for individual motives. For ex ample, ace anonymous reason described gin drinkers as poor ragged people, cursing and quarreling with one opposite, in clear correlation with his books title, Distilled Liquors The terror of the Nations (1736). His passion against gin was predictably conceived from painful firsthand experience in the London metropolis streets. This sentiment is echoed in a different authors similar observation. From a 1747 excerpt of The London Tradesman, he laments that caller is caught in a vicious cycle of drunkenness, im attainable to break. Both authors make out concern from a genuine desire to improve the human condition. However, the like cannot be said for artist William Hogarth in his opposing pictures, Gin course (1751) and Beer Street (1750). Because he was commissioned to create this anti-gin propaganda, his motives were purely business-oriented.Nonetheless, people in Beer Street are portrayed as happy, healthy, and prosperous, while those in Gin Lane are scrawny, lazy, and care less. Another anti-gin activist was religious leader, John Wesley, who excessively possessed an alterior motive for his platform. To maintain a positive image for the freshly founded Methodist church, Wesley deemed it necessary for its members to be pious, God-fearing, and sober. Additional supporters of the gin act include certain politicians whose government positions were contingent upon their ability to foresee the long-term personal effects of major legislation, such as the gin act. Such politicians, including county magistrates from Middlesex and Lord Lonsdale, held the sentiment that gin was a destructive vice that rendered citizens unfit for any serviceable purpose in society. By that logic, they concluded the gin act to be a necessary and justified law that posterity would look soundly upon.In contrast, economists, businessmen, landowners, and other politicians rejected the Gin Act of 1751, but again for different reasons. Economists, such as Daniel Defoe, represented the anti-gin act platform on the grounds that gin was essential to support the landed interest and reduce Englands grain surplus. However, Defoes opinion may have differed had he not been a wealthy man untouched by the horrors of city slums. Because of his detachment from common society, Defoe was only able to see the cold, scientific ramifications of change magnitude gin production. Such was also the case with William Pulteney, a rich landowner who petitioned Parliament for lesser restrictions on gin sale, because gin was a favourable business to which many owed their source of income.Still others protested the gin act for only different reasons. In one businessmans letter to an to the highest degree-valuable gin distiller (1736), he voiced legitimate concern that high gin license fees would violate property rights and hurt the economy. This very issue was also raised by a member of Parliament (1736), who cited vast possible financial losses to the crown as a result of horri fic taxes. Lord Bathurst of Parliament rejected the gin act for yet another reason. He believed drinking in moderation was a necessary demonic for the maintenance of sanity. However, he was oblivious to the fact that alcohol consumption of most English drunkards was anything but moderate.Altogether, the Gin Act of 1751 was a highly moot piece of legislation among the English demographic. While authors, artists, religious leaders, and some politicians defended its morality, economists, businessmen, landowners, and other politicians attacked its potential threat to political and economic stability. However, the act was not repealed, since it took into reckon only those opposed to the sale and production of this great evil.