The owners of the 58 S.C. liquor stores that have a corner on the minibottle sales have muscled into the brave new world of free-poured drinks. If the liquor bill adopted by a Senate subcommittee this week holds up in the General Assembly, these so-called Class B liquor stores will have the exclusive right to deliver big liquor bottles to drinking establishments.

Out in the legislative cold are the state's four liquor-distribution companies. The ideal bill would have allowed distributors to duke it out with Class B stores in the new S.C. delivery marketplace. It is rarely right for legislators to pick winners and losers in the private economy.

But it also is rarely right to allow the perfect to become the enemy of the good in lawmaking. The bill that emerged from the subcommittee - of which Sen. Dick Elliott, D-North Myrtle Beach, is chairman - has a lot to recommend it. It merits passage into law.

The bill recognizes that restaurant, hotel and bar owners should no longer have to journey to Class B stores to pick up their liquor. Under the minibottle regime now passing into history, these good people had to send someone to the stores to pick up their liquor - a real problem in communities that lack Class B stores.

The bill also establishes a 5 percent tax on cocktails, to ensure that the state derives a reasonable revenue stream from free-poured drinks. This should be adequate to replace the state minibottle wholesale tax revenue that will be lost once drinking establishments start using big bottles.

The need now is for the Senate Judiciary and the full Senate to fast-track the bill on to passage - though observers say the earliest the free-pour law could take effect is early in 2006.

That's not good enough. Legislators should expedite passage to allow the law to take effect in time for the 2005 tourism season.

Rapid passage would be more than a favor to tourism establishments with liquor licenses. Another season of drinks dispensed from 1.7-ounce minibottles inevitably would increase alcohol-related traffic accidents on the Grand Strand and in other S.C. tourism venues.

Legislators must not forget why the state's public safety community worked so hard to persuade voters to pass last year's constitutional amendment to end the S.C. minibottle mandate. Drinks from minibottles pack an unexpected wallop for out-of-state visitors, who often are accustomed to cocktails with smaller slugs of alcohol. When they're visiting our communities on vacation, liquor-related accident rates soar - endangering everyone on the road.

It's bad enough that House and Senate committees working on free-pour legislation allowed the nasty delivery fight between distributors and Class B stores to delay the legislation well into the third month of the 2005 session. If legislators remember that implementation of free pour is both a safety and economic issue, perhaps they'll feel stronger motivation to pass a law that takes effect this year. That's what the voters who overwhelmingly approved ending the minibottle mandate Nov. 2 have a right to expect.