Seattle Ends the 'Pay-to-Play' Liquor Fines
A local judge breaks with a years-long precedent of allowing restaurant owners to pay a monthly fee in lieu of a full liquor license.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Seattle, Aug. 3.—Unless Seattle restaurant proprietors take out regular $1000 a year saloon licenses, they will be arrested and fined when they sell liquors, as ordinary 'blind pig' keepers. This new ruling was made today by Police Judge George. He will hereafter refuse to accept monthly fines in lieu of licenses, and will allow the law to take its course. Heretofore, local restaurant keepers have been in the habit of paying into the police court a small fine, generally $10 a month, for the privilege of selling wines and liquors with meals. For a couple of years this practice has been in vogue. There have been no trials on the complaints lodged against the restaurant men, nor have any of them even been booked at the police station. License Inspector Marsh informed them that their fines were due, and they came in and paid them. The amount of liquor sold in most of the restaurants does not justify taking out the regular saloon license, and this system was inaugurated as a favor to the restaurant men. It has been abused according to the authorities. 'There have been several instances where bottles of liquor have been placed in the windows of the restaurants as advertisements,' said Judge George this morning. 'The privilege granted the restaurant men has been abused, and now if they sell wines and liquors with meals, they must take the consequences. I will treat them the same as the regular law-breaker and they will be punished for selling liquor without a license.'
“The privilege granted the restaurant men has been abused, and now if they sell wines and liquors with meals, they must take the consequences.”
The practice of 'pay-to-play' fines effectively legalized underground activity for those who could afford it, a dynamic that echoes in modern debates about how fines and fees disproportionately impact small businesses and marginalized communities while shielding others.
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