ABSTRACT
The majority of states have modeled their method of controlling the sale of alcoholic beverages on licensing private enterprise within a “three-tiered system,” which divides the industry into the supplier, wholesaler, and retailer levels through statutes and regulations. The logic of the three-tiered system is that, by keeping the distribution levels separate and independent, the forces that promote intemperance in alcohol consumption will be tamed as the incentives to excesses are minimized. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., taught that the “life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience.”1 The American experience reveals that legal restrictions on alcohol must be compatible with prevailing social and economic conditions if the goal of promoting temperance is to be accomplished.2 In looking to the future of alcohol control in the 21st century, we must first see where we have been.
