Legal drinking age

The age at which an individual should be legally able to purchase and consume alcoholic beverages remains a controversial social topic in the United States, although the legal drinking age stands at twenty-one years of age in all fifty states. The National Minimum Drinking Age (NMDA) Act, which was passed in the summer of 1984, effectively established this age. It did not actually impose a federal age limit on the purchase or consumption of alcoholic beverages, as each state retains the right to establish its own drinking age. However, the NMDA threatened to withhold federal highway funds from any state that did not establish twenty-one as the minimum drinking age.

Considerable debate persists as to the practicality and morality of the choice of age twenty-one. The United States has the oldest drinking age of any industrialized nation, as well as one of the oldest drinking ages of any nation in the world as a whole, and this generated controversy. Supporters of the current age limit claim that prohibiting teenagers from consuming alcohol protects their health, reduces their likelihood of driving under the influence of alcohol, and reinforces the idea of responsible drinking by highlighting the seriousness of alcohol consumption—an activity that should be reserved for mature adults. Critics of the current age limit question its effectiveness in deterring underage drinking and point out that in the United States, an individual is legally considered an adult upon turning eighteen; denying an individual the right to purchase or consume alcohol for another three years is viewed by critics as an inherent contradiction.

Overview

In January 1919, the United States approved the Eighteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, which outlawed the production and sale of alcoholic beverages in the nation. This ushered in the era of Prohibition, which remained in effect until the amendment was overturned and repealed in December 1933. Following this repeal, nearly every state established the age of twenty-one as the minimum age at which an individual could legally purchase and consume alcohol. However, in July 1971, the passage of the Constitution’s Twenty-Sixth Amendment reduced the minimum age at which Americans could vote from twenty-one to eighteen, thus prompting many states to lower their minimum drinking ages in turn. By the early 1980s, twenty-one remained the legal drinking age in only fourteen states. However, studies in the late 1970s and early 1980s revealed that the number of automobile accidents and fatalities among teenage drivers increased substantially in states that had lowered their drinking ages throughout the decade. This data, along with the activism of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD)—an organization opposed to alcohol abuse in society—set the stage for enactment of the NMDA in 1984.

Despite misconception, the NMDA only applied to the public purchase and public consumption of alcohol (such as in bars or at liquor stores); individual states retained the right to establish their own laws and policies regarding the private consumption of alcohol among persons under twenty-one at home or under the supervision of their parents or guardians.

Topic Today

The issue of the legal drinking age and whether or not it should be lowered is highly emotional, and passions run strong on each side. Those who favor maintaining twenty-one as the minimum drinking age point out the dramatically reduced number of traffic accidents and automobile-related deaths among teenage drivers. Supporters often claim that delaying teenagers’ ability to purchase and drink alcohol is important in preventing the use and abuse of other illegal drugs, as they regard alcohol as a “gateway drug” whose teenage consumers often transition to other substances, such as marijuana or crystal methamphetamine. Supporters note that drinking alcohol is not a legally defined right in the United States, but rather a privilege, whereas voting is a legal right. They see attempts to equate the age of voting (eighteen in all fifty states) with the age of drinking (twenty-one) as a flawed argument.

Supporters concede that although alcohol use in general has decreased during the twenty-first century, underage drinking remains the most widely used substance among youth in the United States, particularly on college campuses. They point out the dangers associated with underage drinking—increased likelihood of being arrested, greater chance of having unwanted and/or unprotected sex, and greater likelihood of experiencing emotional and/or academic difficulties, among other concerns. In 2023, about 5.6 million Americans aged twelve to twenty, or 14.6 percent of that population, reported drinking alcohol in the past month, according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, and 11 percent of high school students reported binge drinking in the past month, according to estimates compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Further, the CDC reported an estimated four thousand young people die from excessive alcohol in the United States each year. Lastly, supporters of maintaining the drinking age at twenty-one point out that according to a 2014 Gallup poll, 74 percent of Americans are against lowering the drinking age to eighteen.

Those who favor lowering the minimum drinking age to eighteen often point out the inherent contradiction in the age of adulthood (legally referred to as the age of majority) regarding the purchasing and consumption of alcohol in comparison to other realms of life. Americans are eligible to enlist in the military, vote, marry, smoke tobacco, and enter into legally binding contracts at eighteen, and every eighteen-year-old male in the United States is required to register for the military draft. Critics claim that an eighteen-year-old should likewise be entrusted with deciding whether to drink alcohol. By maintaining the highest drinking age in the industrialized world, the United States actually limits freedom of choice to a sizable segment of its legally defined adult population. Furthermore, critics contend, reducing the drinking age from twenty-one to eighteen would gradually eliminate the element of “taboo” among college students and other older teenagers, thereby reducing the rebellious thrills of binge drinking.

Bibliography

"About Underage Drinking." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 15 May 2024, www.cdc.gov/alcohol/underage-drinking/index.html. Accessed 28 Oct. 2024.

"Alcohol and Drinking." Gallup, news.gallup.com/poll/1582/alcohol-drinking.aspx. Accessed 28 Oct. 2024.

"Get the Facts about Underage Drinking." National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, National Institutes of Health, Oct. 2024, www.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/brochures-and-fact-sheets/underage-drinking. Accessed 28 Oct. 2024.

Marcovitz, Hal. Should the Drinking Age Be Lowered? ReferencePoint Press, 2010.

Paglia, Camille. “The Drinking Age Is Past Its Prime.” Time.com, April 23, 2014. Web. 10 May 2014.

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Alcohol Alert 67. Rockville: January 2006.