Changing the Minimun Legal Drinking Age in the United States

Changing the Minimum Legal Drinking Age in the United States Over the past twenty years the minimum legal drinking age has been twenty-one in all US states, but that has not stopped citizens of the United Sates from attempting to lower the age. Following the end of prohibition in the United Sates during the Great Depression, all states agreed on a set of twenty-one to be the legal drinking age. For almost forty years there was no change in the drinking age until a decrease in the age for voting occurred. This led to the gradual decrease of the minimum legal drinking age to somewhere between the ages of eighteen and twenty among twenty-one states. Recent data collected by Henry Wechsler and Toben F. Nelson, both of which obtain either a†¦show more content†¦If one is charged with a crime then the eighteen year old is no longer tried in juvenile court; he is tried as an adult. In reality, an eighteen, nineteen, and twenty year old can do just about everything that a twenty-one year old can do, except legally consume alcohol. Who is to say that en eighteen, nineteen, or twenty-year old is not mature enough to properly consume alcohol? Previous research suggests that when there is a more strenuous alcohol policy there will be lower alcohol abuse and consumption among teens (Grube, Kypri, and Paschall 1850). This actually causes teens to feel the need to rebel instead of the thought of teens abusing the privilege. This is a rather immature personality trait to have as a teenager, but there might actually be a reduction in drinking because teens are no longer being rebellious and breaking the law. The whole point of â€Å"becoming an adult† is to give them the ability to take responsibility for their own actions, so why should we not let them? In the United Sates, statistics show that the consumption of alcohol by minors has decreased in the last twenty years, but the consumption of alcohol by adults ages twenty-one through twenty-four have increased (Wechsler and Nelson 987). Waiting until you are twenty-one to legally drink is causing adults to binge drink without thinking of the consequences.