Initiative to Lower the Drinking Age

Lower drinking age to 18. This is about equal rights. 18 year olds have nearly every burden and privilege of adults … except the right to drink alcohol. This is a misguided aberration from 1984 that should be corrected.

Ref:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Minimum_Drinking_Age_Act

In answer to a couple of questions that I have received:

Won’t this mean more drunk drivers?  I don’t think so.

Mother’s Against Drunk Driving (MADD) makes this argument … increased access to alcohol in the brain formative years will lead to more drunk driving.

As counterpoints:

  • Does anyone really believe that 18-20 year olds can’t access alcohol?
  • Surely, the current law leads to additional binge drinking and bad judgement.  Conversely, this would allow 18-20 years to gently transition to responsible alcohol consumption under the supervision of their parents.
  • If their brains are so underdeveloped, then why do we allow them to vote, join the military, serve on juries, etc.  This is an intellectually dishonest argument.
  • If MADD’s argument is true, then why not make the legal age 25 .. or 30 … or 40.  Why not ban alcohol altogether?

What about the financial impact of losing federal highway funds?

This is a bigger deal as it could cost California hundreds of millions of dollars per year.  I can’t argue with the short term impact of that; it is REAL.

However, this is a civil rights issue.  Can you imagine if a minority wasn’t allowed to drink alcohol, and we tolerated that situation because it might cost us some federal funding?

Further, California can and should be a proponent of change for this across America.  With all of our political clout, with our net contribution to the federal government, with our economic size (7th largest economy in the World!), we should be able to get this extortionist law changed. (ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Minimum_Drinking_Age_Act)

Finally, check out this http://www.theamethystinitiative.org/signatories/ … 136 college presidents have signed onto a national campaign to lower the drinking age.