The Legal Drinking Age Of The United States Essay

Society’s attitude towards the drinking age has been a major controversy in the United States. The attitudes regarding the drinking age have been based off statistics and society’s varying opinion. Alcohol is a toxic depressant that has a damaging effect on the human body. As a result, to prevent excessive alcoholic consumption, the ratification of the 18th amendment took place from 1919 to 1939. This established the Prohibition Act, which banned the transportation, manufacturing and selling of an alcoholic beverage. However, illegal production of alcohol continued to take place in secret. Gradually prohibition laws became difficult to enforce. As a result, the Prohibition Act was repealed in 1933. In 1984, congress mandated a law which would raise the drinking age from 18 to 21 through the National Minimum Drinking Age. Reasoning for mandating an older drinking age, was to enhance public safety and promote good health. In 1988, all 50 states enforced the drinking age to 21. The concern for the consumption of alcohol have targeted teenagers and young adults

The legal drinking age in the United States has been argued for many decades. The current minimal legal drinking age is twenty-one but some want to lower between eighteen and twenty. The main focus of the research conducted and opinions of people are based on the minimal legal drinking age of eighteen. The research is taken from the 1970s, when the twenty-sixth Amendment was passed in the Constitution (Wagenaar, 206). It was stated that eighteen is the “age of majority”, so thirty-nine of the states changed their legal drinking age from twenty-one to eighteen. Because of issues with the lowered drinking age, Congress passed the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984. This act required all states to raise the legal drinking age back to twenty-one in order receive the 10 percent federal highway funds (Carpenter and Dobkin 137). By 1990, all fifty states set their minimum legal drinking age to twenty-one. Since this time, many arguments have been raised to lower it back to eighteen. With a lower drinking age, issues for youth include health risks, easy access of alcohol, unsafe drinking environments, and the increase of fatalities.

In the United States of America, there is a minimum drinking age of 21. The legal drinking age legally specifies the youngest age in which a person is allowed to consume and purchase alcoholic beverages. From country to country, there are varying ages of legal drinking ages. There is much debate in the United States on whether the legal drinking age should be lowered to eighteen from twenty one, or should remain the same. People in favor of lowering the drinking age propose that since eighteen is characterized as being an adult (legally and socially), one of the rights that should come along with that is drinking alcohol. Also, that if we were to lower the drinking age, less young adults would be

The legal drinking age should not be lowered in the United States for the safety of all humans.

It has been a rising issue within the past century to have the drinking age set at 21, but many people are more in favor of having the age set at 18. For instance, “’Raising the drinking age to 21 was passed with the very best of intentions, but it’s had the very worst of outcomes,’ stated by David J. Hanson, an alcohol policy expert” (Johnson). Many people believe that having the drinking age set at 21 was a smart idea, but it has caused many more deaths and injuries over the years. Most of these fatalities are cause from people who are underage and choose to consume alcohol. Again, “Libertarian groups and some conservative economic foundations, seeing the age limits as having been extorted by Washington, have long championed lowering the drinking age” (Johnson). These groups see that keeping the drinking age set at 21 is dangerous as it causes more problems to the Untied States. If the drinking age was lowered, or set at 18, there would not be such unforgiving outcomes, like deaths and lifelong injuries, which are usually caused from people who are under the age of 21 drinking alcohol. Although there are numerous groups that are fighting to keep the age

It’s no doubt that alcohol has a major sway on today’s society across the board both culturally and globally. When we take a look into past history, we can see how alcohol has been the fundamental measures to religious, professional, and social concerns. It seems that no matter how far our history books go back, the United States has had a question about the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Through the years of Prohibition halting the sale, shipping, and ingestion of alcohol and the constitutional acts delegating who is accurately fit to drink. Today’s controversy is a lot less infringing on personal rights. It’s regarding whether the legal drinking age should be lowered from twenty-one to eighteen. This has been a huge controversy geared exclusively towards college students due to the fact that alcohol consumption at universities is the definitive part of campus life even though the greater part of students are not legally permitted to drink. It is apparent that through the regularity and risks of binge drinking across universities and the high percentage of DUI and alcohol related fatal crashes, that something needs to shift in this country. Lowering the drinking age to eighteen would be an expedient and positive step in reducing binge drinking, nurturing the safe practice of drinking alcohol, and permitting those students of legal drinking age the chance to fully and sensibly make mature adult choices.

Everyone knows that the United States’s drinking age is at 21, much higher than England’s drinking age. Many people believe that we cause way less destructions than the people of England, but that’s not true. We actually cause more accidents and destructions than they do. The United States’s death rate is actually ranked 39 out of 172 countries at 2.91 while England is ranked at 1.70 on a scale of death rate per 100,000. ("ALCOHOL DEATH RATE BY COUNTRY." World Life Expectancy. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Nov. 2016.) In this case, America’s legal drinking age should be lowered.

In 1984 Ronald Reagan proposed a new law that declared that the legal drinking age must raised up to 21 instead of the age of 18. The law was forced upon the states by threatening them by stating that the government will reduce their highway funding until the states passed the law. Of course all the states eventually change their legal drinking age to 21. Some critics believe that this law’s results have been very successful, however the law possesses many insecurities, but certain programs can be arranged to help educate teenagers on alcohol.

Upon turning eighteen you are considered to be legal adult and receive all of the responsibilities that accompany the title. At the age of eighteen year olds you receive and are expected to use the rights and responsibilities to vote, serve on juries, get married, sign contracts, join the military--which includes taking on the responsibilities of life and death--and be prosecuted as an adults in the court of law along with many other things. In 1984, the national government raised the drinking age from 18 to 21. Mothers Against Drunk Driving was a key contributing organization that influenced the change in the minimum drinking age. While there are arguments for both sides, it is said that if the national minimum legal drinking age is

The drinking age in America has been changed several times since the start of the United States. At the time there were no restrictions on alcohol. One of the next key changes was during the prohibition in the 1930s. This was a time where alcohol was outlawed for everyone in the United States. This did not work because many people drank undercover and the law was difficult to enforce. The most recent, to the legal drinking age, was during the Vietnam war period. At the time, the age limit was set at twenty-one but was reduced so soldiers could drink legally (Daniloff). After the war, the age limit was increased again, since the government thought it was the right idea. This was the last major change to the drinking age so far.

There has been an ongoing discussion in the United States on whether the drinking age should be lowered to eighteen like most of the world or if it should stay at twenty-one. Underage drinking has been a major questionable issue for years, yet why is it not under control? Teenagers are continuing to buy alcohol with fake identification cards, getting into bars and drinking illegally. As a recent teen, I have proof that these things are going on not only in college but in high school as well. There are a lot of factors that come together to why the drinking age should be lowered to eighteen. The most obvious reason is too many people are drinking before they are twenty-one. Liquor stores, bars, and clubs all want to make money and if they

A college freshman walked into his new living quarters on the third floor of the on-campus dormitory to witness his first wild back-to-school college party. Students strolled through each other’s open doorways with red plastic cups in hand. Music blared, a drink was spilled, laughter echoed off the walls, and the young man was offered an alcoholic drink. The young man was encouraged by his new peers to drink, and so he did. But the college freshman was not yet 21 and therefore agreed to many risks by taking that first sip. In my opinion, the drinking age in America should not be lowered. There are too many risks involved in underage intoxication to pass a law promoting drinking at a younger age.

What is the right age to drink alcohol? Alcohol’s reputation varies from one culture to another. For some cultures, like the United States, they perceive it as a “forbidden fruit” while many European countries view it more leniently as another essential complement to their daily diet. In reality, alcohol is essentially a drug, that manipulates people’s minds to make them anxious, dizzy and aggravated. The law understands that drinking alcohol has some side effects and therefore trusts its citizens to be mature about it. According to some people the pros outweigh the cons of alcohol; this is precisely the reason why modern countries attempt to alleviate its circulation because of its effects or even setting restrictive laws upon it. However, with the creation of these laws also arose imminent opposition and doubt over the age of which the laws would restrict. While today’s minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) in the United States is 21, some people argue that the ideal minimum drinking age is 18, because it is safer for the health and it demotes crime while those people face a large opposition stating that the drinking age shall not be 18. On the other hand there is the other side which states that alcohol should be restricted to the age of 25 or above. They claim that it should be 25 because the human body stops developing at that age so it will not get harmed. The compromise is right in the middle of the ages, so that

There has been an ongoing controversy in the United States about whether the drinking age should be lowered to eighteen like in most of the world, or if it should stay at twenty-one. Underage drinking has been a major controversial issue for years, yet why is it not under control? Teenagers are continuing to buy alcohol with fake identification cards, drink, get into bars, and drink illegally. As a teen, I have seen that these things are going on right now in the world. Not only in college but in high school as well. There are a lot of factors that help reason with why the drinking age should be lowered to eighteen; the most obvious reason is too many people are drinking before they are twenty-one. Liquor stores, bars, and clubs all want to make money and if they can get away with selling to underage teens then they will. It is obvious that the law has not succeeded in preventing undreage teens from drinking.

As someone under the age of twenty-one and in college, the legal drinking age is an issue with which I am familiar. In my experience and according to my research, people in the United States start drinking far before the age of twenty-one. The legal drinking age is much debated by scholars and students alike; some find that twenty-one is the right age while other feel like it should be lower-- like in many other countries around the world. Despite strong arguments supporting twenty-one as the appropriate drinking age, I argue that lowering the legal drinking age will not affect health and safety negatively and can even lead to some improvement.