Reevaluating America's Minimum Drinking Age Legislation

Alcohol consumption has been a salient, controversial issue in America, since colonization. In the 1800s and early 1900s, the issue of morality drove opponents of alcohol consumption, leading to Prohibition. Today, however, debate centers on the misuse of alcohol and automobile accidents. In 1984, The National Minimum Drinking Age Act was adopted. Although enacted with worthy intention, increasing the legal drinking age to twenty one has, subsequently, led to many negative issues in society.

The first legislation concerning the minimum legal drinking age was seen during the prohibition era. More recently, the drinking age came under scrutiny in the 1960s, as the Vietnam War reintroduced the draft into American society. Due to the passage of the twenty-sixth amendment, which lowered the minimum voting age from twenty-one to eighteen, many states, in turn, lowered their minimum legal drinking age from twenty-one to eighteen. Under the influence of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, (MADD) Senator Frank Lautenberg composed national legislation to raise the minimum drinking age. The 1984 National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984 obliges that states must

Written and directed by Tom Tykwer, the story follows Lola, as she makes three different, twenty-minute, “runs” in an attempt to save Manni’s life. First, Lola tries to borrow the money from her father’s bank. This run ends, but the film reverts back to the opening scene as Lola refuses to die. In the second run, she robs a bank to retrieve the marks. But, Manni is in a fatal ambulance accident, and so the film returns to the start again. Finally, Lola obtains the money at a roulette table. Similarly to Oedipus, Run Lola Run, in its exploration of free will vs. determinism, supports the compatibilist view. This philosophy holds that free will can coexist with determinism, without being inconsistent or