Indiana’s battle over Sunday alcohol sales has taken an unexpected twist of the bottle cap.
Lawmakers are advancing a bill that would give grocery and convenience stores what they’ve been seeking for years — the right to sell alcohol on Sundays.
But the bill seems designed to make them wish they’d never asked.
According to reports, the bill “would ban self-checkout of alcohol products and require clerks selling them to be 21. It also would require beer to be sold in a designated area, and liquor to be sold from behind a counter.”
One report estimates the changes would force grocery and convenience stores “to spend millions to remodel their stores to be in compliance.”
To sell alcohol on Sundays, the stores would have to make drastic changes to the way they now sell alcohol six days a week. Gaining the right to sell alcohol on Sundays might not be worth the trouble.
In another surprising development, a group representing liquor store owners now supports the Sunday-sales bill, after steadfastly opposing Sunday sales for decades.
Or maybe that’s not so surprising, because the bill sticks it to the liquor stores’ competition — almost punishing grocery chains for making a fuss.
Legislators supporting the bill have cooked up some noble-sounding justifications for its stringent, new rules — such as making it easier for customers to find the alcohol section in a store and protecting minors from seeing alcohol displays.
No one openly admits that, as Ball State University economics professor Cecil Bohanon puts it, the real issue is “package-store profits versus grocery-store profits.”
Last week, the South Bend Tribune criticized legislators for “picking sides, choosing one group of merchants over another.”
The Bedford Times-Mail advised, “Let liquor stores and other retailers operate on the same level, with the same customers, advantages and disadvantages, and surprisingly, we suspect the market will function well for all involved.” It’s a free-market philosophy that you’d think would appeal to Republicans who dominate our state government.
In the big picture, the fate of Indiana doesn’t depend on whether we can buy alcohol in a grocery or convenience store on Sundays. This issue is more interesting for what it says about how some of our government leaders behave.
The best interests of Hoosier consumers seem to carry little weight in the debate over Sunday alcohol sales.
The opinion of our governor is playing no part in the decision, either, because Gov. Mike Pence says he doesn’t have one.
Pence’s reluctance to take a stand on Sunday sales lends weight to the notion that in governing Indiana, he cares most about how he looks to presidential primary voters and campaign donors outside Indiana.
Pence apparently has decided he has nothing to gain by backing either side in the bitter Sunday-sales debate.
Unless, of course, it might impress national voters if Pence demonstrated decisiveness and leadership — qualities we might be looking for in a president come 2016.