For those who do not know, after my interest in politics, two other areas of passion for me include travel and wine. I consider myself to be a wine ‘enthusiast’ — having a modest collection of my own.
I’ve been a member of the Free the Grapes organization for many years. These are the folks fighting make sure that all Americans, regardless of which state they call home, have the ability to order wine directly from wineries and wine producers.
You see, going back to the days of Prohibition, there are a lot of states that have prohibitions on the direct-shipping of wine to consumers or to businesses. Many states have what they call a ‘3-Tier’ shipping system, which means that states require wine shipments to go through a distributor, and then on to the consumer.
This is an antiquated system that is really government regulation that forces wine consumers to spend more on their wines, as this middle-man (the distributor) marks up the costs to make money (with their monopoly) and it also stifles choice for the consumer, as many smaller wineries do not have deals with distributors.
You can read all about this issue here.
Some states have gone so far as to make it a felony for a winery to ship directly to a consumer in their state.
The good news is that last May, on a 5-4 decision, the United States Supreme Court ruled that in some cases, these laws that prohibit the direct shipping of wine are unconstitutional. Specifically, the court ruled that states cannot ban out-of-state wineries from shipping wine directly to consumers while allowing in-state producers to do so.
If you are a real legal wonk, you can read the actual court decision and arguments here.
This has resulted in a lot of action taking place in states where the distributor lobby has spread around big bucks over the years to have a lot of influence. While the obvious solution would simply be for all states to get out of the business of regulating the shipment of wine, perhaps placing some common-sense requirements for proof-of-age on delivery and such, the distributors are trying everything possible to keep their government-enforced monopoly. Rather than making the case to wineries and restaurants that they should voluntary use distributors as a convenient way to get wine from the producer to the consumer, these distributors prefer a system where there is no choice for the consumer OR the distributor.
The reason why I am giving you this background is to heap some praise on a politician – one about whom you have probably heard — Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. Romney, who (believe it or not) is the REPUBLICAN Governor of this very blue state, is criss-crossing America making a bid for the Republican nomination for President of the United States.
At some point, we’ll try to reach out to each of the candidates to talk about their feelings on the Golden State. But for now, I want to take an opportunity to heap some praise on this man.
You see, when this court decision came out, Governor Romney made it clear that he feels there should be no government-imposed restrictions on the direct shipping of wine to Massachussetts consumers, for personal or retail use. Unfortunately, the distributor lobby is strong in his state, and so the legislature passed and sent to Romney’s desk legislation that, while pretending to give the freedom-to-buy to consumers, the devil is in the details. If a winery produces over 30,000 gallons of wine a year, then that winery may not ship directly to Massachusetts consumers. Doing some math, this means that a winery that produces over 12,500 cases in a year cannot ship to consumers. This is a VERY LARGE PERCENTAGE of wineries.
It also requires wineries to use a distributor if they have already been using one. In other words, this legislation is aimed more at finding a narrow path towards continuing the domination and monopoly of the 3-tier system. Rightly so, Governor Romney vetoed this bad legislation, but unfortunately his veto was over-ridden by the legislature.
But Governor Romney is unphased, and has introduced his own legislation this year to give real opportunities and choice to wine consumers. In the meantime, the distributor lobby has been trying to "spin" the newly passed law as somehow being ‘freedom to ship’ friendly. That just isn’t the case.
So a big FlashReport "shout out" goes to Governor Mitt Romney, who is a leader in the battle to Free The Grapes
