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Yes, it's 21 in every state, with the exception of New Orleans, LA... there's some legal loop-hole that allows you to drink at 18, which my brother - a Tulane grad - was pretty happy about. As for checking ID, it really differs from place to place. Some didn't card me when I was 16, and others still check mine at 30!
Not that I'm a "drinker", but I do indulge once in a while...
gizmo, I don't think that's the case. N.O. isn't any different from the rest of the Louisiana. I know that Louisiana was the last state to raise it's minimum age from 18 to 21, and it happened not that long ago. But I wouldn't call it a loophole, I'd call it the federal government strongarming the states for highway money.
In California you can buy beer/wine/hard liquor 7 days a week from 6:00 a.m. to 2:00 a.m. on the following day. Like a previous poster wrote - you can buy at grocery stores, mini-marts, gas stations, 7-11's - practically any where.
Nebraska has 13 classes of liquor licenses. It depends on what you are doing as to which lisence you need to sale liquor, wine or beer. You can open up a shop to sale liquor, wine or beer as long as you get a license. Right now you can buy it at grocery stores, mini-marts, convinence stores or just the old fashion liquor stores. Section 53-116.02
Liquor, wine or beer can not be sold only between the hours of 1:00 am to 6:00 am any day of the week. However local governing bodies can by ordinance or resolution make the closing time prior to 1:00 am and also can order the closing on any day of the week. Like on Sunday if the chose. Section 53-179.
You have to be 21 years old in order to have liquor, wine or beer in possession anywhere that it is sold. You can drink liquor, wine or beer legally only at your personal home residence. Section 53-180.02
You can not drink liquor, wine or beer on any public property controlled by the State or any other governmental subdivision unless it is authorized by the governing bodies. Section 53-186
You can see all of these laws and the rest of the laws dealing with liquor, wine and beer in Nebraska by going to this link here.
Hi, I live in Montana. You can buy beer/wine pretty much anywhere from 8 a.m. to 2 a.m. 7 days a week. You can buy hard alcohol in a bar with a "full" liquor license and at liquor stores. Most bars that aren't in restaurants are "full liquor license." Stand-alone liquor stores are closed on Sundays, and you can only buy hard alcohol from bars on Sundays. However, there are liquor stores that are just part of bars, and you can buy bottles "off-sale" any day of the week. We also have microbreweries. They have tasting rooms on premise where you can only have a certain number (something like 3 beers?) and I think they can only be open until 7. However, some brewpubs have attached bars or restaurants with beer/wine or full liquor licenses, and those can be open until 2 a.m.
No counties are dry. In fact, until recently, you could actually drink while driving a car up car up to the point of being legally drunk. As long as you were just under the limit, it was perfectly legal. However, that just changed. Weird, huh? That's coming from a state that didn't have a speed limit for a while either. So, we are at least becoming a little safer. I'm big on encouraging people to take free cab rides home because it is a really alcohol-soaked culture here.
I'm a part-time bartender on the side of my day job(s), and we get frequent "stings" coming through with people who are minors posing as over 21. So, we are very picky about ID's. It's a $500 fine to me personally the first time I get caught accidentally serving a minor.
Yes, you have to be 21 in every state, and they do take it fairly seriously. With a halfway decent fake ID, you can get into some places - but without a fake ID, you'd be out of luck. I'd be concerned about bringing a fake ID in from a foreign country, particularly France.
And most states are putting a bar code on the back of ID's as a verification of Identity, and so five-0 can swipe your license and write you a faster ticket. LOL....
The wiki link is useful, but there is no real information for Illinois. We are pretty lax on our alcohol laws, but I'm fairly certain we actually have some.
However, I do like that I can buy the hard stuff in the grocery store and don't have to deal with any sort of 'caps' on the amount of alcohol in beer. how do people in states with alcohol caps drink that fancy Belgian stuff, are they just not allowed?
Oh, and I'm confused by the whole concept of 'dry county' how does that work, how does a restaurant operate in a dry county? Are no restaurants allowed to serve alcohol in those counties, and anyone who wants a nice meal with a glass of wine has to drive over one county to get one?
Hi Jhlcomp. Thank you for your help and concern. I had already come across the wiki link. It is incomplete and does not go beyond the state level. What I learned initially is that liquor laws differ greatly within a single state on the county and local level. There are plenty of anomolies, such as 'wet' cities in 'dry' counties and many other variations of the federal/state/local level.
I'm just curious why you would take two seconds to google 'liquor laws by state', paste a link and then act like you went out of your way to prove how proficient you are at conducting research. That is lazy. If you were really going to show how smart you are you would write my whole paper for me, put together a power point presentation, film it and then post it on youtube complete with your self-produced soundtrack of ambient glitch music. Can you have it done by Tuesday?
Last edited by keith4gigs; 04-09-2007 at 09:59 PM..
Reason: punctuation
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As for checking ID, it really differs from place to place. Some didn't card me when I was 16, and others still check mine at 30! 
