Noah S. Sweat

Who was Noah S. Sweat?

Judge Noah S. "Soggy" Sweat, Jr. was a judge, law professor, and state representative in the U.S. state of Mississippi, notable for his 1952 speech on the floor of the Mississippi state legislature concerning whiskey. Reportedly the speech took Sweat two and a half months to write. The speech is renowned for the grand rhetorical terms in which it seems to come down firmly and decisively on both sides of the question. The speech gave rise to the phrase If-by-whiskey, used to illustrate such equivocation in argument.