The history of the National Minimum Drinking Age Act truly started back before Prohibition. The temperance movement used selective prohibition (drinking ages) as a stepping stone approach to their goal of outlawing all alcohol. Finally they did achieve the goal of total Prohibition of alcohol, and in 1919 the 18th amendment to the constitution was ratified. Due to the apparent ineffectiveness of  Prohibition and the change in public opinion, the 18th amendment was in 1933 repealed by the 21st amendment. What followed was a compromise with the lingering temperance movement and the modern drinking age was established. "The political failure of general Prohibition meant that American adults would increasingly focus justifications for alcohol policy less on the perils of drunkenness and more on the tenuous

      From the end of Prohibition until 1984 drinking ages were determined by the states -- many of them had the age at 21 while several lowered the age to 18 for the purchase of beer. This was changed by the activism of the "Baby Boom" generation during the Vietnam War. From 1970 through 1975 nearly all states lowered their legal ages of adulthood, thirty including their legal drinking ages, usually from 21 to 18." (Males 194) It was argued that if people were required to fight and die in a foreign war then they should be allowed the privilege of drinking alcohol. This generation exercised previously unheard-of clout and political muscle, and through years of protest and many valid arguments this generation of youth gained back some lost liberty. After this period, however, public sentiment changed. The baby boomers were aging and the freedoms they for which they fought for themselves no longer seemed important when they involved someone else.

On the other hand, RALLY was founded on the Syracuse University campus in the spring of 1995 because no other campus group was realistically confronting underage drinking issues from the perspective of college students. RALLY's founders believe that current government policies, in which tax-paying, voting students are adults in every area of life except alcohol, are both contradictory and counterproductive. “RALLY holds that young adults should accept responsibility for both their own behavior and the challenge of promoting preventative alcohol education on their own campuses. RALLY offers college students, long excluded from national alcohol policy debates, a mechanism for change with which they can voice their support for social policies all young adults can both live with and respect.”.

That is what the NYRA and RALLY are looking forward to. They aren’t a group who just like to swim against the flow or just seek more liberties. They are both groups who want a better, safer, and more mature America.

Since 1984, the legal drinking age in the USA was set to be of 21 years of age. Ever since then, Americans have seeked for ways to reduce the accidents and tragedies caused by alcohol consuming people, and the access of minors to it. Is imposing new laws on alcohol and restricting it even more really going to stop young adults and minors from irresponsibly consuming alcohol?

As long as the law keeps becoming more and more strict on alcohol consuming, it will only make things worst. The best way to act on this sort of things is to do the opposite. If alcohol were to become more accessible, people wouldn’t abuse it as much for it wouldn’t be such an attraction. Plus if youths were exposed to it at a younger age, with the help of their families guidance, they could reach the maturity to refuse drinking or at least drink responsibly.

Some topics in this essay:
Age Act, Syracuse University, Jim Doyle, Washington University, Vietnam War, It’s CU’s, Rights Association, Generation Alcohol, Driving MADD, NYRA RALLY, drinking age, alcohol policy, national minimum, age act, legal drinking, national minimum drinking, drinking age act, minimum drinking age, minimum drinking, legal drinking age, drunk driving, drinking ages, alcohol consuming, alcohol accessible people, age 21,