Whiskey Rebellion Essay

Meaning when a tax is placed on a certain item, whiskey, in this demand model the producer, the farmers, would pay most of the tax. At the time the federal government saw whiskey as a luxury and so placed the tax on the distillers, raising the price of production in return decreasing the amount produced. They saw they could pay off their debt, by taxing the whiskey, and the producers of whiskey would pay for the debt for them. Therefore, the National debt incurred during the Revolutionary war and, the supply and the demand of whiskey are related. It was shown that only the distillers who produced less would pay more because of the tradeoff of equity end efficiency, meaning that because of the debt from the war, the government needed a way to pay for the debt and taxed whiskey. Concluding that the supply and demand elasticities of whiskey are completely due to the taxation put on the whiskey to pay for the

Slaughter divides The Whiskey Rebellion into three principal sections entitled Context, Chronology, and Consequence. The first section begins with a comprehensive assessment of the anti-excise tradition which follows late seventeenth-century British philosophy and traces its progression from Walpole's excise battle in 1733, through the Stamp Act crisis of 1764 and on through the Anti-Federalist account of the tax provisions of the Constitution of 1787. In the second section, Slaughter details the debate over the excise, its implementation and the outbreak of both peaceful and violent opposition to it; opposition that occurred not only in Pennsylvania but along the entire frontier. In his final section, and with a trace of personal bias, Slaughter describes the outbreak of violence in the summer of 1794 for which he holds John Neville largely accountable. Slaughter continues in the final section with Hamilton and Washington deciding to make an example of western Pennsylvania despite the fact that the excise had gone uncollected all along the frontier, and the Watermelon Army fiasco which the Federalists

Towards the end of the 16th century, the United States government experienced continuous changes in laws(taxes) and several problems(battling and removal of Indians) associated with westward expansion. Conflict was created in response to the rising taxes issued by the government on goods such as whiskey. Most affected by the heavy taxation were the creators and distributors of whiskey - the average poor white farmer. An incident that occurred in 1794 involving enraged farmers in western Pennsylvania, threatened the tax collectors lives as well as the authority of the government. This incident came to be known as the Whiskey Rebellion.

Unfortunately for the National Government, Congress did not have any power to collect taxes from people in each individual state. The Congress could ask for money, but could not by any mean force states to pay them. The National Government greatly needed money to cover expenses and debts. Congress could not pay the Nation’s debt, which meant they could not provide much needed

During the eight years under the Articles of Confederation, the national debt continued to grow. The country came up with solutions, but the states ignored them. A correspondent in the Independent Chronicle in 1787 plead, “How long are we to continue on our present in-glorious acquiescence in the shameful resistance that some of the states persist in, against federal and national measures?” (Humphrey 2003, 113). Printer Nathaniel Willis called the young country a “union in crisis” (Humprey 2003, 106). Lack of revenue and no way of forcing states to contribute was one of the major and most noted flaws in the Articles of Confederation (Henretta et al. 2010).

There were many rebellions in the United States history, some peaceful and some violent. Shays' Rebellion in 1786 and the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794 are examples of two brutal rebellions that led to death of many innocent people. Rebellions can develop due to many conditions including unfair laws, unfair treatment, and a disagreement over a sensitive topic. The Shays' Rebellion showed the Articles of Confederation was too weak, while the Whiskey Rebellion proved the Constitution to be a strong framework of government.

What is the first thing someone would think about when whiskey is mentioned? A fun Saturday night out? Maybe, but it they probably did not think about the Whiskey Rebellion of 1791. This Rebellion was resisted by farmers who were accustomed to distilling their excess corn to make alcohol in four small counties in both Pennsylvania and Western Pennsylvania. This Rebellion was met full force with troops set by George Washington. This event was a prime example of the battle between State’s Rights versus Federal Authority as illustrated in the book, Founding Brothers written by Joseph J. Ellis. Even today, the battle continues between the States and the Federal Government regarding the issue of legal marijuana. This issue started 2012 when the

Gordon sums up the American economic history in six chapters of his book. He explains that the United States had taken on huge debts following to the American Revolution. In order to pay such debts back, Hamilton created the federal bank and convinced the Congress to issue federal bonds. This way the federal government could make interest payments on time, build credit and keep the inflation from rising. Hamilton thought that the national debt could be a useful tool in order to create capital for the new industries. In his book, Gordon also recalls that soon after the 1812 War the seventh President of the United States cleared the government debts thanks to surpluses deriving from high tariffs. Then, he explains that the introduction of the first Federal income tax in America during the Civil Was turned out to be crucial in order to investigate how to distribute the tax

In 1791, under the advisement of Alexander Hamilton, congress passed the whiskey tax. This tax, put a twenty-five percent tax on whiskey. Hamilton created this tax in hopes of the federal government gaining more money to help pay of the nation’s debt. However, in doing so, this angered many people, especially farmers in western Pennsylvania, because they distilled the extra grain they had to make whiskey and sell it to make extra income. These small operations in western Pennsylvania rebelled by erecting liberty poles and taring and feathering tax collectors. George Washington, who was president during this time, saw the outburst and decided to take action against the angered farmers. Washington gathered about 13,000 men from the militia to put an end to this rebellion. In doing so, Washington showed that the government help the power over the citizens. In The Whiskey Rebellion, by Thomas Slaughter, he describes different consequences that arise from the whiskey tax. Slaughter presents three main points, which include conflicts between the east and west, two political systems that begin to develop, and the actual rebellion.

Shortly after Alexander Hamilton created the tax on whiskey which was used to pay off the Revolutionary war debt, some farmers started to cause issue in the wilderness. After the tax was passed a group of farmers went out in the woods they captured a tax collector they , stripped him naked, shaved off his hair, poured hot tar all over his body, covered the tax collector in feathers, and finally strapped him to a tree in the middle of the night which caused the rebellion to start. According to “American History: The Whiskey Rebellion: From the August 2014 Issue”,”A group of armed men accosted whiskey tax collector Robert Johnson in a lonely stretch of forest in western Pennsylvania in 1793. They pulled Johnson off his horse and ordered him to strip, cut off his hair, poured hot tar on his body and dumped chicken feathers over the tar.” Then shortly after the tarring, more farmers were joining the Whiskey Rebellion against the whiskey tax.

Following the American Revolution, the American nation and states were faced with enormous amounts of debt. To resolve the economic hardships the new nation had been experiencing, leaders turned to taxation as a source of income to resolve debts. Those who lived in the backcountry, which was isolated from society, were often shocked by the newly imposed taxes and most times resented them. Their resentment in relation to the taxes sparked protests and led to large scale rebellions to express their grievances to the government. Both Shay's rebellion and the Whiskey Rebellion were similar in their causes and purpose but they differed in consequences and their significance.

     The Whiskey Rebellion of 1794 helped bring about the demise of the aristocratic Federalist Government in favor of the democratic Republican Government, concerned with the needs of all of its citizens.

After the Revolutionary War the United States had a massive debt to deal with, but because of the Articles of Confederation the federal government could not raise taxes to pay off the debt (Blake). States were responsible

Hamilton was able to persuade Congress into passing a twenty-five percent tax increase on such products. This did not go over all too well in the west, especially concerning small farmers in Pennsylvania. At the time, farmers processed their corn and grain into whiskey, since it was less complicated to transport their crops in liquid form rather than in bulk. Whiskey was also used as barter at this time. In retaliation to this tariff, farmers took it upon themselves to harass the federal tax collectors, and showed their hostility and disdain by stopping judicial proceedings. In response to this, Congress attempted to lift the most severe proclamations of the levy, but this was to no avail in the farmers' eyes. Since a majority of the farmers' used the barter system, they simply could not come up with the money necessary to pay the tax. Their vexation mostly stemmed from their belief that the "unresponsive government" lacked to "understand the hardships they faced" since the government quite clearly did not grasp the concept of a deficiency of affluence (Encyclopedia of American History: Revolution and New Nation, 1761 to 1812). Throughout 1771 to 1773, the farmers' resistance was noticeable although not yet notable until 1774, where they then decided to handle the complication themselves.

Superficially, it may have been deemed an act of censorship to the Constitution’s critics; however, the tax on whiskey initially implemented helped create a better America by reducing the national debt to concentrate money into the securing of the nation’s individual liberties. A new, national militia helped secure the individual’s liberty, preventing other countries from controlling the United States, especially under the proclaimed tyrannical rule of Britain. The so-called censorship of the Whiskey Rebellion helped other individuals claim their liberty after the civil unrest caused by the uprising.