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Let Georgians vote

Editorial

FOR THE past two years, the Georgia Legislature has dropped the highball.

In 2007, both the House and Senate backed off companion bills that would have allowed voters in local cities and counties to decide whether to allow Sunday alcohol sales. The politicians bowed to pressure from those who oppose alcohol consumption, based mostly on religious grounds.

Last year, Gov. Sonny Perdue penned an opinion piece that ran in newspapers around the state predicting tragic outcomes should alcohol be sold on Sundays.

The governor failed to explain how a DUI fatality on any other day, or a traffic death on a rain-slicked highway, would be any less tragic.

Nor how allowing Sunday sales in restaurants, from which patrons must drive home, but not at package stores, from which customers buy beverages to consume at home, passes the logic test for road safety.

However, the specter of a gubernatorial veto kept lawmakers from passing a Sunday sales provision in 2008.

But 2009 might just be the time for lawmakers to let local communities decide when and where responsible adults can shop for items that are otherwise legal to buy and enjoy.

Sen. Seth Harp, R-Midland, who introduced the Senate bill two years ago, said the state's current budget crunch might be enough to convince legislators to pass Sunday sales legislation. Or, in other words, to start treating their constituents like grown-ups.

The measure Mr. Harp supports would not give immediate statewide approval to Sunday alcohol sales.

Rather, it would allow such sales after local officials put the question on the ballot and local voters approved the referendum.

Such local votes mean communities could block alcohol sales on Sunday if a majority of voters opposed it. By the same token, if a majority of voters wanted it, then those who'd like to drop by the store on Sunday to pick up a bottle of pinot noir or some pale ale for dinner could win the right to do so at the ballot box.

Besides the value of getting state government out of the way of self-governance, allowing package alcohol purchases on Sunday would boost sales, pumping millions more tax dollars into state coffers. That's an important point with state government looking at a $2 billion budget shortfall.

Grocers and convenience store operators support Sunday sales because they understand the growing importance of Sunday as a shopping opportunity amid today's busy schedules.

Two wage-earner families with children might not have enough time after school, work and band practice to do the next week's grocery shopping by Friday.

In today's down economy, making it more convenient for Georgians to pump money into local markets deserves serious consideration. Paired with the benefit of a strengthened democracy, a Sunday alcohol provision deserves ultimate passage, and the governor's signature.