to the serious detriment of the business in pure brands, the Jewish compounders were far from satisfied. There remained a few American brands whose names, by reason of their dependability, topped the list. Their very quality, though of limited quantity, was a constant challenge to the vicious mixtures of which the rectifiers produced millions of gallons a year.
How to remove those standard American brands, with their honest labels, from the market?—that was the problem which the leaders of the Jewish compounding business tackled. The first resort was, characteristically, to trickery. Shipments of pure goods would be sidetracked somewhere en route, while the rectifiers drew off half the whisky and refilled the barrels with mixed compounds. People who have been amazed at the stunts of the bootleggers—the sidetracking of whisky shipments, the “robbery” of loaded trucks, and so on—would not be so surprised if they knew that every trick was used by the compounders of bad liquor twenty years ago! It was Jewish then, as it is Jewish now, but no one dared say so. Merely to list the tricks would require too much space. It was a nasty business from any point of view.
But still the standard brands held their place in public confidence. The Jew who claims to be the superior of the American in skill did not think of making a better whisky and thus winning the market; he thought to get rid of the better whisky that the vicious, adulterated product might own the field.
It was the day of Trusts. Big Business was amalgamating. It occurred to the leaders of the compounding business that if they could sweep all the honest distilleries into a combine with all the backroom rectifying places, put them all under one management and run down the quality of famous brands to the standard of cheap ones—cashing in on the names of the brands, and doubly profiting by decreasing the cost which quality requires—they could thus accomplish in a financial way what had been formerly tried by less respectable methods.