What about the 21st amendment and booze?

[NRAninja]

The recent NO GUNS FOR 18 YEAR OLDS thread made me wonder about the 21st amendment and alcohol. I haven't done researched credible soruces about this, but I have heard bits and pieces in political science classes and stuff.

Basically, what I'm wondering is how the whole "you have to be 21 to buy, consume, blah blah alcohol" thing started. Here is all the hearsay I've gathered so far:

In the 70s, you could still buy booze if you were 18. At some point that decade (or the early 80s) There was an incident in Maryland regarding a bunch of high school punks driving around drunk with 10 people in the bed of their pickup truck. There was a crash and they all were killed. This is the incident MADD used to get their organization going much like Brady getting shot and HCI. This is what I've heard. Is this true?

Here is the next part of the story I've put together from what I've heard:
MADD started a campaign to get the drinking age raised to 21. They were able to pass a federal law but someone took it all the way to the supreme court and argued on a 21st amendmet angle. The supreme court said then when congress repealed the 18th amendment, they gave up their power over booze, and the law was overturned. Of course, the supreme court didn't have the balls to incorporate the amendment just like it never did with the 2nd, so the states were free to do whatever they wanted.

Since MADD lost at the federal level, they lobbied all the states to change their laws and the federal government extorted the states that didn't want to with the whole highway funding thing. Eventually every state caved in and went to 21. That's why when you go into a bar you see signs that say "As per (insert state here) law, you must be 21 blah blah blah blah"

Is that how it all went down? Was there a supreme court case over it? Does anyone have links to credible references about the 21 alcohol age?

Also, do the liquor store people have forums where they badmouth the BATF like the gun boards? Do they have a Neal Knox equivalent calling them all JBTs? Do liquor store owners go to jail for 10 years if they don't pay the tax on their case of 200 proof assault booze?

 

[another okie]

There is no federal law setting the drinking age, but Congres uses the threat of withholding highway funds to force states to raise it. I've never heard of a federal attempt to set the age, but that doesn't mean it never happened.

When I went to college the drinking age in Oklahoma was set by Oklahoma law at 18 for women and 21 for men. That was overturned in 1976 in the US Supreme Court case of Craig v. Boren, and the age became 18 for both until the feds blackmailed us into raising it.

 

[gunsmith]

from what I remember

I (sort of) remember drinking in bars at 16yrs old in NY City...I passed out alot
By the time the drinking age was upped I was allready ,uh,25? ...I dunno.
Even though I generally support an 18 yr old drinking age,now that I'm an old geezer and seeing how poor they drive sober,...I dunno

 

[c_yeager]

My feeling is that as long as 18 year olds are eligable for the draft then they are elligable for everything else. If you are old enough to be REQUIRED to fight and die for your country then you sure as hell are old enough to drink a beer in your country.

I remember feeling really pissed off about that when i was filling out my selective service card.

Granted that isnt nearly as silly as not letting an 18 year old buy a pistol. If the guy is mature enough to man an artillary position i dont really have a problem with him owning a handgun either.

The problem is that a fair majority of "grown ups" don't really care about the 18-21 year old group very much. And that age group is absurdly bad about showing up at the ballot box. In other words don't expect it to change anytime soon.

 

[Langenator]

I think any challenge to a Federal drinking age law would have been based on 10th Amendment/Commerce Clause issues. Specifically, retail sales of alcohol are not any sort of interstate commercial transaction, and hence beyond the power of the Feds to regulate.

But the highway funding blackmail part is true.

A fun challege for some ballsy state govt to try would be to drop their minimum age back down, then go to court when the Feds cut highway funds and charge that the highways are post roads-and maintaining the post office and post roads in something the Constitution does tell the Feds to do.

 

[c_yeager]

A fun challege for some ballsy state govt to try would be to drop their minimum age back down, then go to court when the Feds cut highway funds and charge that the highways are post roads-and maintaining the post office and post roads in something the Constitution does tell the Feds to do.

I got one too! How about one of the states that puts more into the treasury than it takes out tries this. And when the .gov wants to take their highway funding the state says "FINE, we just wont be sending any tax dollars out anytime soon." My state puts FAR more INTO the government coffers than it takes out. We would be better off WITHOUT those highway funds.

It really does tick me off that we have to go to the feds to ask them nicely if we can have some of our money back to build transit systems in this state.

 

[NRAninja]

Another thing I heard that I forgot to mention is that you can booze on a military base if you are 18. Is that true? Wouldn't that sort of back up the feds not having that power?

 

[rich2u]

B_stards did the same thing with the speed limit. 55 or we cut your funding, man we need some serious B_tch slapping in washington

 

[Langenator]

NRAninja-

You can't buy alcohol on CONUS military bases unless you're 21. Now, if said base happens to be in Germany, or some other country with a lower drinking age, the age limit on post drops to 18. Because there's no point in not allowing the soldiers to buy on post what they can get right outside the gate. And AAFES would rather they get the money.