OCR Text |
Show i LEARNED JUSTICE DECIDES CASE ON CHARGE FOR GLASS OF BEER 4 " M By UITOX BRON'NER. t ( European Manager. N. E. A. LOIsTDON, May 15. In the old days ,: "when beer was to be had Sn the Sy:;t United States, can you imagine Chief a-'.-"., promo Court and some of his fellow- a justices sitting in a case in which 1 'a saloon-keeper had been fined $25 , for selling beer at too high a price? jyTfco Of course, you can't. .1"; And that's whero there is a dlffcr- , enco between America and Great Brl-V-" 7 tain. - Britain still enforces a war-tlmo act y ' regulating ahe price at which beer may bo sold. Some tlmo ago the claim was made that a customer of the Spotted Dog, a saloon in Barking, a suburb of London, Lon-don, was charged too much for a glass of beer. Tho saloonkeeper was fined ?25 by the local justice. Pie fought it all the g . way through tho courts until finally l" ' Lord Chief Justice Reading and two , more justices gravely heard grave aVg- ', -uments about the grave matter of . charging too much for a glass of beer. ; Great Britain believes in that kind k--. of Justice. s It wasn't the few pence involved. a ,It was the principle: could a man be allowed to charge more than the l rules said? And Reading, tho man who had M represented his king over in Ameri- y ca as ambassador and chief high com- H mlssloner, dealing in financial mat- B ters involving billions of dollars, sat up on the judicial throne in his grayl B wig and found: that tho prlco charged for the glass of beor -was 9 centd, ' H ;. which would bo at tho rate of 22.2 fl cents per imperial pint, whereas tho n. maximum chargo allowed for such a pint was but 16 cents. There ensued a learned discussion of tho true meaning mean-ing of the law, followed by a decision dismissing the appeal. If tho appallant wants to, ho can still tako this case of a glass of beor to the House of Lorde. |