Booze on the ballot
Republican state lawmakers, after decades of getting thwarted by either members of their own party or a governor from the other party, are once again trying to slay their white whale — and Pennsylvania’s white elephant: the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board.
Once again, we desperately hope they succeed.
This time, supporters of privatization have wised up. They know their cause is enormously popular — 60% of voters supported the end of the state stores, reported a 2013 poll — but they keep running into state officials whose connections to special interests, not to mention lack of imagination, make reform impossible.
In 2015, Gov. Tom Wolf vetoed a popular privatization bill.
Now, Rep. Natalie Mihalek, R-Upper St. Clair, has proposed bringing the question of privatization to where it belongs: the people. She has introduced a state constitutional amendment that both legislative chambers in two consecutive sessions would need to pass, before voters could have their say by referendum.
In a state with too much archaic and inefficient government — does anyone know what a prothonotary is? — the PLCB is the very worst of it. Veterans of the liquor privatization debates know the history well: The commonwealth’s alcohol bureaucracy was founded in 1933 by a prohibitionist, Gov. Gifford Pinchot, solely to make the purchase of wine and spirits as unpleasant as possible.
He succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.
The persistence of the PLCB testifies to two enduring truths about politics: First, an entrenched bureaucracy, no matter how unpopular and inefficient, is almost impossible to break. And, second, an eclectic but well-funded and passionate alliance of special interests, no matter how undemocratic, can wield extraordinary influence.
In this case, it is a union representing a few thousand retail employees with sinecures linking arms with international liquor corporations, which love the simplicity of selling to an entire large-state market through a single middleman.
They’ll try to convince Pennsylvanians that anarchy and cataclysm will befall the state without the enlightened hand of the PLCB guiding their alcohol purchases. But crossing a state border — any state border — is enough to see it’s all smoke and mirrors.
They’ll also say a constitutional amendment is a blunt instrument to deal with a complicated maze of rules and regulations. But when privatizers tried to slay this dragon with a thousand cuts, they got nowhere; maybe the gleaming sword of an amendment will do the trick, and state officials can sort out the details later.
The PLCB is the clearest and most egregious example of the archaic government Pennsylvanians have endured for far too long. Taking it down will not only improve the experience of buying alcohol but also give every citizen of the commonwealth hope that real, historic reform in Harrisburg is possible.