Click here to see the other side of the Point-Counterpoint: “Vote ‘No’ to help Mass. Budget”

The main thing most students have to worry about, besides from the apocolypse and the looming threat of midterm exams, is what we’re going to buy at the liquor store. Since we don’t have that much money anyways, it’s not usually a problem. A 30-rack of Bud Light Alfredo (or whatever the most recent marketing strategy is to hide the fact that their selling carbonated water) won’t set most of us back too much. But taxing it does raise the price, since the store owner, already out the money for a liquor license and with a mortgage or rent and debt to pay off, must do the rational, traditional thing and water down the drinks.

Okay, no – he must pass on the costs to us.

So not only is that Bud Light Chicago Deep Dish Style just water, it is expensive water, after taxes. Now, if you want an actual alcoholic beverage, like Colt 45 or Rubinoff, you need to be prepared to pay more. If you actually want to get drunk and forget about the recession because you have no future beyond underemployment in a fast food restaurant or, if you’ve been especially bad as an undergraduate, upon commencement you’ll be condemned to eternal torment and damnation in graduate school.

Alcohol, then, is clearly vital to maintaining a firm grip on reality and protecting one’s mental health, unless you’re among the people who are stricken with problems controlling their intake. If you have a religious objection to drinking, as the Church of Latter-Day Saints and the vast majority of Islamic schools of thought do, then I respect your choice even if I don’t understand it.

Fermented and distilled beverages are not only a vital thread in this country’s history, but especially the history of Massachusetts. After all, the Pilgrims on The Mayflower were headed to Manhattan, but had to put ashore in Plymouth because they ran out of beer. Unfortunately, the first thing Squanto did when he met the new arrivals was ask them for beer, which was such a total party foul back then that it set back relations between the English colonists and the native Americans for centuries.

Later on, a Bostonian named Benjamin Franklin said “Beer is proof that God exists and wants us to be happy.” Truer words were never spoken, especially about college. Around the same time, George Washington – patriot, president, Revolutionary general and an overall pretty OK guy – became the largest distiller in the country when Mount Vernon produced 11,000 gallons of whiskey in 1799.

Hard liquor has a darker side to it than regular beer. The trade in rum between Africa and North America formed a major leg in the transatlantic slave trade, and if rum-for-slaves wasn’t bad enough, distilleries operated by plantations – like Washington’s – were worked by slaves. During the 19th century, with clean water supplies limited, many people drank regularly for their daily liquid intake, and the alcoholism and violence that resulted from that added fuel to the Prohibitionist fire.

But back to the 1700s for a moment. During Washington’s presidency we first learned the reason why taxing alcohol isn’t a good idea: It annoys people. After Congress decided to tax whiskey, the farmers who made a lot of it for extra cash because it was easier to bring to market than the crops fermented an anger so strong it kicked off a genuine Whiskey Rebellion. It wasn’t a Tea Party so much as a Bourbon Party, but people were still waving the Gadsden flag around and talking about the tyranny of Washington, only they meant George and not D.C.

Washington did the thing that any sound American president would do: He and Alexander Hamilton rode out there at the head of a small army, and their numerous muskets and bayonets convinced the farmers that, yeah, they had pretty good representation for their taxation.

It’s easy to see the problems Massachusetts would face if the sales tax on alcohol remained in place. Beer and liquor would be brought back from New Hampshire and sold out of car trunks, tax-free. Governor Patrick (or Baker – who knows?) would be forced to enforce the law and they would get stuck in a quagmire for years, costing the state billions because they had completely forgotten there was any Massachusetts between the Berkshires and Worcester. They’d also drop like flies from dehydration because they’d be looking for “bubblers” and not water fountains.

It’s just not worth a rebellion and the suppression thereof over Bud Light Tomato & Basil, so vote “Yes” on Question 1 Nov.  2. As for me, not only am I from Vermont, but I already voted. I think I’ll have a beer.

Matthew M. Robare is a Collegian columnist. He can be reached at [email protected].