Comité de Salut Public drinks bill...?

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

I heard a reference to the Committee of Public Safety's drinks bill on a radio programme a couple of years ago, but I've never come across a written reference to it. Does such a thing exist, or was it a post-Thermidor 'hey, don't blame us, we were drunk all the time' excuse? I've also heard similar about the Tribunal, but again haven't found a reliable, non-anecdotal, non-hostile source.
I'm also aware that the average alcohol intake was universally far higher from the dawn of time until the 19thc - it was safer than water!
On a related issue, does anyone know if the opiate laudanum was used/abused in France as much as it was in Britain at the time? I don't know how greatly the trade links would have made a difference here. I can't remember ever having come across a reference in anything on the Revolution - the Romantic poets in Britain in the 1790's were living on the stuff - but I did wonder if that, rather than the usually assumed bisexuality, may have been Camille Desmoulins' 'vice'?

Comments

[estellacat.livejournal.com]

I've never seen a written reference to that either, but it would make sense--assuming it also ; after all, the Convention had it's own restaurant where the Conventionnels could eat, and when there is food there is usually drink--and in this period, often of the alcoholic variety (though I have read a lot of references to lemonade stands during the Revolution). I don't really see why the CSP couldn't have ordered both food and drink from the restaurant to be brought to them; after all, many of them were sleeping there and they would have to eat and drink sometime. (Moreover, It seems likely to me that, assuming such a practice existed, hostile sources, as you term it, would have seized upon the occasion to talk about a "drinks bill," and conveniently leave out related information--such as a food bill or at the very least a note about alcohol consumption in the 18th century.)

That's an interesting theory about he laudanum. It sounds at least as plausible as any other explanation I've heard. On a somewhat related note, there's a hilariously out of character scene in "Saint-Just et la force des choses" where Robespierre has an argument with Saint-Just, waits for him to leave, throws his glasses accross the room, makes sure no one's coming, and then has some laudanum. Somehow, I think if Robespierre had had a laudanum addiction we would know about it. -__-;

[wolfshadow713.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't be surprized if some of revolutionary politicians did use laudanum at least occasionally. By the nineteenth century (so I am assuming by the last decade of the eighteenth century as well), it was used rather widely as treatment for, among other things, anxiety and insomnia, conditions with which a revolutionary politician would likely be familiar.

[lucilla-1789.livejournal.com]

Laudanum was used for digestion problems, aches, insomnia, anxiety etc. but then, the whole 18th Century medication system was so horrible, that many people tried to avoid doctors alltogether. Bloodletting to cure fever killed a lot of people. (They also used mummy powder, for any health problem, which sounds really weird.)

Drug addiction became topic of public discussion somewhere during 19th Century and was considered to be a problem amongst neurotic, lonely, middle aged women. People also gave laudanum to babies to keep them quiet, which caused loss of appetite and made some people to be addicted most of their lives.

18th Century is famous for tea, coffee and hot chocolat, which were really trendy. Of course I'm biased here (I'm teetotaller) but I'd think, that they drank less alcohol than earlier generations. (17th Century diet would kill us all in few weeks)Compared to earlier centuries the prefered behaviour was calm and rational, and you cannot really stay that way if you drink only beer or wine the whole day.

Most of the people of course drank water more than anything else. In cities it was considered unclean (with good reason) but most of the people lived on countryside.

So the "safer than water" means city life and medical opinions of those days that banned also all vegetables as dangerous. If you lived in a hut near the woods, like 99% of people in any nation those days, there were clean streams and wells. People also washed themselves with water in countryside, but not in cities...

[wolfshadow713.livejournal.com]

Robespierre wasn't known to drink heavily (I think Scurr mentioned in Fatal Purity that he generally drank rather watered down wine), but he did of course consume a fair amount of coffee. I think I remember reading, however, that some of his colleagues were heavier drinkers.

[livviebway.livejournal.com]

I remember reading in "An Elegant Madness" that William Pitt consumed around 6 bottles of port per day. Bottles were smaller, but not THAT much smaller. I wouldn't overestimate the influence of alcoholism and drunkenness in preventing someone to run a government. ;-)

[hanriotfran.livejournal.com]

Well; I don't find anything scandalous in regular drinking.Of course I do not like alcohic people. In Europe, even today, people uses to drink, and heavily, but most of them are not alcoholized. I mean that they are so used to drink that they uses not to be intoxicated by alcoholic beverages. Maybe that was the case about some French Revolution leaders. Of course, our perfect, dear Maxime wouldn't drink so much. Only a glass or two of wine with a lot of water in them. My Hanriot , even if he was not - it seems - the alcoholic of the legend depicts, liked to drink a little, along with friends...It was quite natural at the time. But his favorite drink was not wine; he loved champagne *cough* *cough*...What an aristocratic taste! :D

Yes; laudanum was not seen as a drug back then: you would take it just to cure some physicall illness or at least, to calm them. I don't think they considered it a vice...At the start of XX Century even cocaine was not seen as a bad drug. I have magazines from that time in which there is publicity of medicines made with cocaine.

HanriotFran (Vanesa)

[hanriotfran.livejournal.com]

"Alcohic"??? LOL ...I just mean "alcoholic", but my new keyboard is too sensitive!

HanriotFran (Vanesa)

[chip-squidley.livejournal.com]

I know we were talking awhile back about if "Salut" would be better translated as Safety or Salvation. But it can also mean "Cheers!"...as in a drinking toast ;)

In seriousness though...I'm sure many of them would at the very least have had a couple of glasses of wine after an intense day!