[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 97 (Thursday, June 27, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7080-S7082]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      ALCOHOL INDUSTRY ADVERTISING

  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, this is a time when our Nation is working to 
curb alcohol abuse. I am troubled by a disturbing step backward by at 
least one member of the alcohol industry that I consider a significant 
threat to our society. There has been much recent opposition expressed 
by other Members of Congress to the Joseph E. Seagram & Sons Corp. 
blatant violation of a liquor industry advertising ban.
  In 1948, the liquor industry in this country adopted a code of good 
practice, a self-imposed decision not to advertise distilled spirits 
products over the airwaves of the emerging radio and television 
technology. In the past 38 years that I have been a U.S. Senator, 
liquor companies have voluntarily complied with that agreement, 
abstaining from advertising on the influential mediums of radio and 
television--until now.
  Earlier this month, Seagram Corp. began airing commercials for its 
Crown Royal Canadian Whiskey on a television station in Texas, 
defiantly breaking the industry's promise to our country, and self-
indulgently putting sales dollars ahead of the future of our children.
  I have long decried the quality of much of television programming. 
The overwhelming influences of television

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on our Nation have contributed mightily to the moral decay in our 
communities. No group is affected more by the irreverent programming 
than our children. In all too many homes, today's youth are reared by 
the ``electronic babysitter.'' Studies show that the average child will 
view 25,000 hours of programming by the age of 18. While this 
broadcasting brew is already being polluted by commercials from the 
beer and wine industries, it is even more important to guard against 
mixing hard liquor ads into the cauldron.
  The Seagram commercial not only defies the industry's own longtime 
agreement, but it also aims to appeal to a younger audience. The liquor 
advertisement portrays two dogs graduating from ``obedience'' school. 
One holds a mere newspaper, while the other carries a bottle of Crown 
Royal. The canine with the newspaper is labeled simply ``graduate,'' 
while the other dog with a bottle of whiskey is titled 
``valedictorian.''
  In addition to the youth appeal of animal characters, the propaganda 
is further propelled by the background tune ``Pomp and Circumstance,'' 
recognized as the music played at countless high school and college 
graduations this time of year.
  I find it reprehensible that the Seagram Corp. would associate 
academic achievement with hard liquor. Think of it; associating 
academic achievement with hard liquor. How preposterous.
  Alcohol is the No. 1 drug problem among young Americans--and some 
older ones as well. It is the leading cause of death and injury for 
teenagers and young adults. Drinking impairs one's judgment. And 
alcohol mixed with teenage driving is a lethal combination.
  The Senate recently approved an amendment which I introduced that 
requires States to adopt a zero tolerance standard for drivers under 
the nationwide legal drinking age of 21. The zero tolerance law 
corrects a loophole to help ensure that underage drivers who register 
blood alcohol levels as low as .02 percent are subject to State imposed 
drunk driving sanctions.
  This action not only will help to save lives--and it may be your 
life, and it may be your life, and it may be your life to save--but it 
will also serve to send a message, the right message, to our Nation's 
youth that drinking and driving just will not work.
  I have been asked upon some occasions to participate in advertising 
that would say, ``Do not drink and drive.'' I did not say ``Do not 
drink and drive.'' I said, ``Do not drink, period. Do not drink, 
period.'' There is nothing good in it. Alcohol consumption leads to a 
higher crime rate. It is a contributing factor in assaults, murders, 
and other violent crimes.
  As a member of the West Virginia State Senate in 1951, I requested of 
the warden of the West Virginia Penitentiary that I be a witness at the 
execution of a young man by the name of James Hewlett. James Hewlett 
was from Fayette County, a neighboring county to my own county of 
Raleigh in West Virginia.
  Hewlett had asked a cabdriver to take him from Huntington to Logan. 
On the way to Logan, Hewlett shot the cabdriver in the back, robbed 
him, dumped his body by the side of the road, and went on his own way 
with the cab. He was later apprehended in a theater at Montgomery, West 
Virginia. He was sentenced to die in the electric chair.
  For months he rejected the idea of having a chaplain in his cell. But 
as the months and weeks and days went by, and Governor Patteson of West 
Virginia declined to commute his sentence, Hewlett knew that he was 
going to have to die, and he asked for a chaplain to be with him in his 
cell.
  On this particular occasion, I drove from Charleston, the capital, to 
Moundsville where the West Virginia Penitentiary is located.
  I asked the warden if I might go down and talk with Jim Hewlett in 
his cell. About an hour before the execution, I was allowed to enter 
the cell of Jim Hewlett. I shook his hand, and shook hands with the 
chaplain in his cell.
  I said to Hewlett, ``From time to time I speak to young people; Boy 
Scout groups, Girl Scout groups, 4-H clubs. I wonder if you might have 
a message that I can pass on to these young people as I have an 
opportunity to visit and speak with them around the State.'' He said, 
``Tell them to go to Sunday school and church.'' He said, ``If I had 
gone, I might not be here tonight.''
  We exchanged a few more words. And as I was about to leave, he said, 
``Tell them one more thing. Tell them not to drink the stuff that I 
drank.'' ``Tell them not to drink the stuff that I drank.''

  I have told that story many times to young people around my State.
  ``Tell them not to drink the stuff that I drank.'' Those were 
Hewlett's exact words.
  I said, ``What do you mean by that?'' The chaplain broke in, and 
said, ``You see that little crack in the wall up there?'' He said, ``If 
he were to take a drink right now, he would try to get through that 
little crack in the wall. That is how alcohol affects him.''
  I then said goodbye to Mr. Hewlett and to the chaplain, went on back 
to the warden's office, and at 9 o'clock he called us up to his desk. 
And he said, ``We will now go over to the death chamber. If you have 
cameras leave them here. There will be no picture taking, and when the 
execution is over we will return here.''
  I witnessed the execution.
  Several years later I was in the northern panhandle of West Virginia, 
and someone suggested to me that I go down and see the local priest who 
was very ill. I did not know the priest. I did not recognize the name. 
It was Father Farrell. So I got the directions and drove down to see 
Father Farrell. He was very ill. But we talked a little while.
  And how I came to tell this story, I do not know how it occurred to 
me to tell this particular story. I had never seen Father Farrell 
before, to my recollection. So I told the story, and he listened very 
carefully. When I had finished telling the story of witnessing this 
execution and having visited the cell of Jim Hewlett prior to the 
execution, Father Farrell said, ``Yes. That is the way it was. You see, 
I was the chaplain in the cell that night when you visited Jim 
Hewlett,'' which shows that there is, indeed, a wheel that turns, and 
we never know when we will see someone in later years whom we have met 
before, perhaps in some distant land and different clime.

  The point here is that this young man, who stood staring death and 
eternity in the face, said, ``Tell them not to drink the stuff that I 
drank.''
  So alcohol consumption leads to a higher crime rate. It is a 
contributing factor, as I say, in assaults and murders and other 
violent crimes. It was a contributing factor in the crime that was 
committed by Jim Hewlett. It leads to numerous health problems as well 
as to the gradual death of habitual drinkers. Oftentimes, it leads not 
only to the death of the drinker but leads also to the death of someone 
else--an innocent mother who is driving a car--perhaps, with some 
children in the car with her. Oftentimes, the intoxicated driver 
escapes without injury or ends up with only a few bruises after he has 
killed someone else.
  An individual of legal drinking age makes his or her decision to 
drink, but surely it is careless to impose messages relating 
valedictorian status--how obnoxious, how obscene, is such a statement--
impose messages relating valedictorian status with whiskey and to 
broadcast these messages through the seducing medium of television.
  My concern is for the future quality of life of the citizens of this 
country. Television's impact on our society is already excessive, 
bombarding viewers with scenes of violence and obscenity.
  Results of one study found that, on average, by the time a child 
reaches the seventh grade he or she has already been exposed to more 
than 100,000 assorted acts of violence. And while, in my own 
estimation, television industry executives have largely failed to 
exercise proper responsibility for the quality of their shows--as a 
matter of fact, there are very few shows that have any quality at all, 
any positive quality; they have, instead, a negative quality--I do give 
them credit today because, since the ban, the three major broadcasting 
networks have thus far refused to run hard liquor advertisements, and I 
encourage them to continue this prudent policy.
  The liquor industry's trade association, the Distilled Spirits 
Council of

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the United States, claims that the advertising ban is outdated, old 
fashioned, and is a throwback to Prohibition era concerns. But 
distilleries know as well as I know that television has grown 
increasingly influential in our society, which makes the code of good 
practice ban more important than it ever was.
  As a nation that purports to care about the health, safety and well-
being of its people, and as a nation that spends billions of dollars 
every year on the health care of its people, the very least we can do 
is to try to address the dangers of alcohol by discouraging the early 
drinking that often results in later addiction, alcohol dependency, or 
even more unfortunate consequences.
  It is dangerously irresponsible for liquor companies to merchandise 
their vices using the influential power and looming ubiquity of 
television. Shame. Shame on the Seagram Corp.--shame on the Seagram 
Corp.--for defying its own agreement with the people of this country.
  I urge every member of the liquor industry to comply with the 48-
year-old decision to keep liquor ads off the airwaves--off the 
airwaves. The health, the well-being, and moral character of our Nation 
far outweighs the profit that might be generated from broadcast 
advertisements peddling hard liquor.
  Mr. President, ``Tell them not to drink the stuff that I drank.''
  I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Inhofe). The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. NUNN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded. I say to my colleagues, this is only for 
a speech, after which I will put the quorum call back in.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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