For the Fourth of July holiday weekend, in all 50 states, one thing will be consistent: Many Americans will be drinking. Last year, Americans spent $3.9 billion on alcohol (mostly beer) for July 4th, according to Capital One Shopping Research.
But the laws governing when, where and what kind of alcohol you can consume are different in every state. Like driving laws and school curriculum, alcohol is regulated individually by state governments.
What do our nation’s drinking laws look like? While some things stay consistent — you need to be 21 to purchase alcohol and you cannot drink and drive — almost everything else varies per state.
So before you start your cross-country road trip, or head across state lines for a barbecue, here are the things you need to know about America’s liquor laws.
Buying alcohol on Sundays
Blue laws, or those designed to limit what people can do on Sundays, have mostly been repealed across the United States. We can still see the remnants in the four states that do not allow alcohol sales on Sunday (Delaware, South Carolina, Mississippi and Nebraska) and the two that state liquor stores close (North Carolina and Utah).
Buying alcohol in grocery stores
If you’re used to throwing in beer or wine in your grocery card – or having to drive to a completely different store to complete your shopping – the opposite might seem alien to you.
There is no common rule across the United States as to whether alcohol can be sold in grocery stores.
Whether or not hard liquor can be sold in grocery stores usually relates to if the state is a “control” state. This means state governments control the wholesale retail of distilled spirits and, in some cases, wine and beer. According to the National Beverage Control Association, 17 states fall into the “control” category, and in 13 of those, the government controls retail sales for off-premises consumption, meaning there are state-owned or state-designated liquor stores.
Many states have moved to expand…
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