Alabama Homebrew Legalization

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On February 7th the 2012 regular session of the Alabama legislature began. There is a homebrewing legalization bill that will be filed in the next few days. Once I know the bill number I will post it.

For more info you can visit this website: www.alahomebrewing.org
Or www.freethehops.org
The second on is more for beer laws in general but you can find info on all the state representatives.
 
On February 7th the 2012 regular session of the Alabama Legislature began. There is a homebrewing legalization bill in the works rights now a will be filed very soon. Once there is a bill number I will post it.

A couple of good websites: www.alahomebrewing.org
www.freethehops.org ( this one is more about beer laws in general but you can find info on how to contact a state representatives and how they voted in the past)
 
This was the latest that I saw:

Legislative session begins Feb 7th. Representative Mac McCutcheon will again sponsor the Alabama Homebrewing Bill in the House. There will not be a Senate House version of the bill. The House of Representatives is the most difficult to pass for this type of legislation, so we are starting there. Senate and both house committees should pass relatively easily.

Since last years defeat, the bill has been reworked to include language required by the ABC Board, some restrictions that the ABWA wholesaler lobby wants clarified, and some social issues that were insisted upon by opposing legislators and prohibition groups. The text of the bill will be released soon and the initial draft version will probably be posted online at the official site http://www.alahomebrewing.org.

Some of the new provisions being drafted:
   15 gallon production limit per quarter (= 60 gallons per calendar year)
   NO possession quantity limit per household
   NO license requirement
   Homebrew will still be technically prohibited to possess in dry areas
   Homebrew competitions will be allowed
   You can transport homebrew and give it away as gifts
   An outstanding issue will be the exemption to take homebrew into a licensed establishment for a homebrew club tasting
   There may still be issues with offering homebrew at beer festivals

But...

Check this out.

I'm not holding my breath. What a bunch of ignorant idiots.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Unbelievable, sorry to see such proceedings going on in this country. Good luck...
 
Even the idiots are going to have a hard time arguing that it is a bad thing if the president has been serving homebrew at the Whitehouse!
 
wailingguitar said:
Even the idiots are going to have a hard time arguing that it is a bad thing if the president has been serving homebrew at the Whitehouse!
Click to expand...

In Alabama? Better keep the president out of it if you want the thing to pass.
 
Alabama's legislature is a perfect example of the Peter Principle... or, in layman's terms, that the s*** floats to the top.

60 gallons per year? WTH is that? I probably would not exceed this, but that means I can only make one batch per month. Lame.
 
wailingguitar said:
Look at the video... Most of the opposition was from those of his party, the bill was sponsored by a Republican.
Click to expand...

Trust me when I tell you this - party means nothing in our state legislature. It's one huge cesspool of shockingly uneducated sleazeballs looking to work the most personally lucrative backroom deals.
 
Makes it hard to be optimistic with that big of a gap between the yeas and nays. Also, no way to dispute the ignorance of their concern of regulating how much is brewed. We are so far behind the others states. I only live about 2 miles from GA where it is legal.
 
It's crazy, isn't it.

The one guy drinks Chevas because it's healthy. Ha!

I'd like to ask the guy that said if there were sixty gallons around when he was in high school that he and his buddies would drink it how many cases he and his friends take to hunting camp.

What a backward assed state and what a bunch of dumbasses.
 
homebrewdad said:
Trust me when I tell you this - party means nothing in our state legislature. It's one huge cesspool of shockingly uneducated sleazeballs looking to work the most personally lucrative backroom deals.
Click to expand...

The person I was replying to seemed to be suggesting, without actually saying it outright, that it was either a party thing (Alabama being largely conservative politically) or, perhaps, racial (let's hope not)... I was pointing out that opposition came mostly from within his own party, and that the bill already had support of the opposition party, so using the president as a positive example would (should!) work.
 
wailingguitar said:
The person I was replying to seemed to be suggesting, without actually saying it outright, that it was either a party thing (Alabama being largely conservative politically) or, perhaps, racial (let's hope not)... I was pointing out that opposition came mostly from within his own party, and that the bill already had support of the opposition party, so using the president as a positive example would (should!) work.
Click to expand...

Oh, I know. I fear that you are really giving the legislature far too much credit in assuming that they operate like most politicians - i.e. yesmen who follow party lines.

In Alabama, your bill will never see the floor if you don't help sme of the powerful guys with at least one (usually many) bills for which he personally benefits (or unles there is a public outcry... and maybe not then). Once it sees the floor, you have to sell your soul to get votes.

I have little doubt that the Alabama legislature could go toe to toe with any of the top corrupt givernments in the world.

Who stands to make money off of homebrew legalization? Nobody, so the chances of success are quite low.
 
homebrewdad said:
In Alabama, your bill will never see the floor if you don't help sme of the powerful guys with at least one (usually many) bills for which he personally benefits (or unles there is a public outcry... and maybe not then). Once it sees the floor, you have to sell your soul to get votes.

I have little doubt that the Alabama legislature could go toe to toe with any of the top corrupt givernments in the world.

Who stands to make money off of homebrew legalization? Nobody, so the chances of success are quite low.
Click to expand...

I believe they will find a way to start taxing the hell out of us now if it passes.
 
There were at least two AHA sanctioned competitions (Heart of Dixie BrewOff) in Birmingham around '98/'99... I judged in and sat best of show panel both times. In the early/mid 90s The Birmingham Brewmasters met at a LHBS that was basically around the block from the Homewood Police Dept. they never hassled us at all, quite the contrary, they made extra trips by when we were meeting to make sure no one was messing with our cars. A few times the officers would come inside, chat, hang out and B.S. with us. It makes me sad that despite so much forward progress, there has actual been some backwards movement with homebrewing here. Sure it wasn't, technically speaking, legal then, but no one gave a damn or bothered you...
 
FWIW...

No new changes in the bill. I do not see it introduced into the system yet.

The plan is now just to focus on legalizing homebrewing in general.
Events, festivals, competitions will be a future concern.

Fwd: from Right To Brew

The changes from last year are the 60 gallon annual production limit, the exclusion of convicted felons from homebrewing, and a new "Homebrewed fermented beverages" legal term to simplify the bill (and make it easier to for future
legislation, should we decide to shoot for comps or other freedoms later). Yeah, we punted competitions, because ABC restricted them so
much last year that no comp would ever have happened. As Rich said, there is no license/permit requirement, and Mac knows that adding one
would be a showstopper for us. This bill is certainly not set in stone, yet, but it's good that Mac hasn't been pressured by ABC (or
anyone else) to make changes to it over the past few months since we talked about these changes with him.


--

To enumerate what we have already compromised down since our original bill last session:

- Reduced the annual household production limit by 70%.
- Completely removed homebrew competitions, events, and conferences, allowing homebrew only at private homes.
- Added a provision to preclude convicted felons from being allowed to homebrew, to keep "bad people" from abusing the law.
- Included all remaining changes requested by ABC last year.

The point is that we have compromised down pretty much everything we can live without already, so if your representatives tell you that we
have to bend (i.e., compromise) to pass the law, you can explain that we have already given up most of our original provisions.
 
Just to update everyone on the status. The bill passed the committee vote already. It will go up for floor vote in the house "soon." The revised version of the bill caught a lot of us by surprise. Here are the key points:
  • Homebrewing is legalized in wet counties only.
  • Quarterly household production limit of 15gallons (that's per household, not per person).
  • Household possession limit of 15gallons (this one really sucks and has lost us some homebrewer support).
  • Up to 10 gallons at a time may be transported from the home, but only to ABC licensed events.
  • No one under 21 may brew.
  • No one under 21 may purchase ingredients or equipment to brew (Alabama makes it illegal for people under 21 to buy plastic buckets!).
  • Violations of the law are now 2nd degree misdemeanors rather than felonies.
  • The bill defines mead and cider.
  • Convicted felons are not permitted to brew.

The possession limit caught us all by surprise. The deal is, we have multiple competing lobbies that want to be satisfied: The wholesalers don't want any competition with commercial beer. Alabama Beverage Control (ABC) is currently ignoring homebrewers anyway, but they want to make sure they have the tools to prevent underage drinking, and they don't want any confusion about what types of alcohol are and are not allowed. ALCAP ("Alabama's Moral Compass" - basically the religious group) wants to return to prohibition and will at least push for tighter regulation and control while opposing the resulting bill anyway.

Apparently the legislators weren't fooled by the production limit and insisted on a possession limit as something ABC could enforce. Unfortunately we found out too late to request that the possession limit be set to the annual production limit rather than the quarterly limit. Any relaxation of the restrictions now will be completely visible to the entire legislature and will almost certainly kill the bill until next year. So, yes. This is a pretty horrendous bill, and many of us will probably be violating both the production and possession limits at times. But at least those will be misdemeanor violations that won't be detected without a search warrant anyway. Right now, if the cops drive by and spot us brewing, we can be charged with a felony.

Our sponsor said that the email campaign has been successful and has requested that the emails stop for now. When the bill is scheduled for a vote, we'll start it up again.
 
I find the quarterly "limit" humorous. And the possession limit.

How are they supposed to know if you've only brewed 15 gallons per quarter? I regularly have less than 15 gallons on hand at any given time. Two taps and 1 extra keg means I have 15 gallons when my pipeline is full! But I can certainly brew more than 15 gallons a quarter, but I wouldn't keep track either.

Granted I'm the only one brewing and drinking in my house.

So what the consensus? Accept this and try to pass it, or wait for a better deal? It might be a few years before people accept the "consequences" of the bill and expand the permissions.
 
The consensus position is to just go with it. Like I said, right now homebrewing is a felony in the state, and there is a strong defense industry presence here, especially in north Alabama. A felony means no more security clearance and would kill the careers of quite a few of us.

We were originally leaning towards 60gallons per year (the equivalent of one batch per month), but we thought 15gal per quarter would sound better to the legislators. When they slapped us with the possession limit as well, we were kicking ourselves for proposing the quarterly limit. 60gal per year + 60gal possession isn't so bad. But still, it will be difficult to enforce. It's better than what we have right now.
 
Given the way that the laws rapidly changed for commercial beer in the last couple years, I imagine that the possession limit won't last long. It sucks, don't get me wrong, but I seriously doubt they are going to be checking in to see who is making how much, how much they have on hand, etc. If the possession limit is a sacrifice we have to make to get the body of the law through, fine... in a couple years it will change, I'm sure. I think that once they see that nothing bad happens when it becomes legal, we will be able to get the specifics we want in fairly short order. Let's just get this out of the way!

That being said, I would like to once again note how big a step backwards we have taken here. Used to be that despite homebrewing not being technically "legal", we didn't get hassle ONE from the authorities... on duty police would come by our meetings in Birmingham to chat, for God's sake. We had sanctioned competitions in Birmingham too, pretty big events held in a very public place (the Pickwick Hotel). It makes me sad :(
 
I know the limit sucks but lets just get this bill passed first then we can whittle away at the limits in years to come.
 
I got this in a e-mail today. It points out some pretty stupid restrictions in other states.

No point to be made. I just found it interesting (and a bit disturbing...)

GA - A 50 gallon limit per household.

TN - Has a 5 gallon transportation limit. We may get 10 gallons.

AR - Forget your Wee Heavy boys, they have a 5% ABV limit. By title 28 we have a 13.8 limit.

KY - Homemade beer cannot be gifted or shared. What shared means, I don't know, but sounds like you can't take you beer to Bubba's backyard BBQ. We can, unless we want to have an organized public event, then we have to think ahead (at least 25 days ahead) enough to apply for a no cost special license.

LA - Special Events Permit required by venue for festivals, meetings, judging, etc. Each venue can have 12 Special Events Permits annually.

MS - Illegal. Now there is a backward state. ;)

SC - 5% ABV limit.

WV - 6% ABV limit.

Other non-Southern states:

ID - Have to use native grown products. No bull. Can you find Alabama grown barley? Forget Maris Otter.

IA - 5% ABV limit.

MT - 7% limit.

NE - Made solely for the use of the maker and his or her family and guests. No transportation provision.

OK - Must get a permit.

NJ - Need a permit.
 
I know that Oregon has some laws about transporting, not sure of the details, but it has put homebrew competitions out of commission for the the time being. Yep, even beer-friendly Oregon has screwy laws regarding beer.

While I don't know how they would go about enforcing it, the $15 fee that NJ used to have doesn't sound as bad to me as some of the other stuff, and if it meant brewing or not brewing, I would happily pay it
 
So right now our progress is the same as last year's, right? And hoping to get past the House this time with the revisions?

I can live with the limits and as someone said earlier, if we can get it legalized we can tweak it later.
 
Yes, the limits are unreasonable, but I don't really think they are routinely going to come around to count our bottles and weigh our kegs. As for any production limit, they can't know unless they install surveillance cameras all over our houses and yards. The limits might make someone feel better that they have a well-defined marker for under the table commercial operations, but that's what the standard 200 gallon a year limit is for. It's creepy that Anheuser Busch and the Baptists are teaming up to lobby against this and the politicians are trying to please them. Maybe I'm just a math guy, but it would be nice if they could have realized last year that 100 gallons a year amounts to less than 3 beers a day. Are we really trying to prohibit moderate drinking or diminish competition for companies who sell lots of lousy beer here? If the latter, are they being bribed directly or indirectly? And don't they know that people who want to home brew rarely buy Anheuser Busch products? I often wish freedom was still considered a great ideal for patriotic Americans.

This little university town is full of felons. Just today, I happened to meet yet another professor in another department who is an avid wine maker. I think the new bill is certainly flawed, but would remove any real worries about what Barney Fife might just decide to do. I've never worried much, but it's not good to possibly be the first victim of some new whim of a loony law enforcement official. While I brew at the entrance to my garage, there is a cop living in sight of my house, but he's a home brewer too.:tank:
 
You know most of these laws are really because it's harder for the government to tax barley and hops than to simply tax bars and breweries. Such crap.
 
wailingguitar said:
I know that Oregon has some laws about transporting, not sure of the details, but it has put homebrew competitions out of commission for the the time being. Yep, even beer-friendly Oregon has screwy laws regarding beer.

While I don't know how they would go about enforcing it, the $15 fee that NJ used to have doesn't sound as bad to me as some of the other stuff, and if it meant brewing or not brewing, I would happily pay it
Click to expand...

I was just thinking that this kind of thing might have been a good thing to pitch to the legislature. They like money. We could tell them to collect a license fee every year from us; then they'd want to make it the most attractive hobby possible. And if they caught us without a license, as the Wayans brothers used to say, "mo money, mo money, mo money!"

I doubt having 20 or 30 gallons around at once is going to be particularly risky, but if any of us like to brew at least 5 gallons a month and age some things more than 2 months, we'll definitely be in violation of the 15 gallon stock limit. That's just two batches packaged and one in the carboy.
 
A homebrew license was proposed by parties in the legislature, and the homebrewers overwhelmingly rejected the possibility for the following reasons:
With a license, you're giving your name and address to the ABC and signing a document stating you'll abide by whatever additional stipulations they include in the law.
Breweries are already subject to random inspections. There is a risk they could slip this into the bill or add it at a later date.
Similarly, given the way alcohol laws go in Alabama, it would be easy for them to start increasing the license fee each year to unreasonable levels. Since they already have our names and addresses, those with lapsed licenses could be subject to visits and fines if they fail to renew the licenses and continue to brew.
The list goes on. There are too many potential scenarios with the license that could cause us trouble in the long run. Besides, we don't need a license to barbeque in the back yard or bake bread in our kitchens. Why should we need one to make liquid bread in our garages?
 
Absolutely agree about the license, DocBrown. If it passes as is, even though it is not ideal, it is a victory. Even though the limits are low, it would be tough to enforce and probably won't be enforced unless a person does something to put himself on the radar screen.
 
DocBrown said:
A homebrew license was proposed by parties in the legislature, and the homebrewers overwhelmingly rejected the possibility for the following reasons:
With a license, you're giving your name and address to the ABC and signing a document stating you'll abide by whatever additional stipulations they include in the law.
Breweries are already subject to random inspections. There is a risk they could slip this into the bill or add it at a later date.
Similarly, given the way alcohol laws go in Alabama, it would be easy for them to start increasing the license fee each year to unreasonable levels. Since they already have our names and addresses, those with lapsed licenses could be subject to visits and fines if they fail to renew the licenses and continue to brew.
The list goes on. There are too many potential scenarios with the license that could cause us trouble in the long run. Besides, we don't need a license to barbeque in the back yard or bake bread in our kitchens. Why should we need one to make liquid bread in our garages?
Click to expand...

Yes, that makes sense. It's better to stay away from the license.

On your closing thought, I would add that they don't tell us how much we can barbeque in the back yard or how much we can put in the freezer for later. Same goes for the bread. It would be nice to revive that quaint old American ideal of freedom, but I'll be glad if this passes for now.
 
Another nice thing about passage of the bill is that, even with the restrictions, our beloved state would come in 49th, as opposed to 50th, yet again. Go 'bama!

Wait a minute; don't misunderstand me. I mean "bama" as a state, not a college football team.

War Eagle!
 
orthobrewsky said:
another nice thing about passage of the bill is that, even with the restrictions, our beloved state would come in 49th, as opposed to 50th, yet again. Go 'bama!

Wait a minute; don't misunderstand me. I mean "bama" as a state, not a college football team.

War eagle!
Click to expand...

+1
 
I've been looking on line and can't find any results of today's vote.

Does anyone have any news?
 
I just found this:

Didn't Get a Vote
posted 13 minutes ago by Brant Warren
Our bill was #6, but the House did not get through 3 before adjourning for the day, so HB354 did not get a vote today. The good news is that we did get on the calendar, and pretty early, so the chances of getting on it again soon are high. Thanks to everyone who emailed all of the representatives. We had an incredible showing! However, our opponents have started their phone calls today, so we definitely need to work to outnumber them!!! Be sure to make your phone calls to your representatives by the Contact Your Representatives page.
 

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