There has been a trend of growing support for legislation in states such as Vermont, Wisconsin, and South Carolina to lower the drinking age back down to eighteen despite data that suggests that current age limits save lives.
Debate over lowering the drinking age is heating up in several states, fueled in part by legislators who contend that men and women who are old enough to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan are responsible enough to buy alcohol legally. ~ USA Today
This argument seemed eminently sensible to me as I neared my eighteenth year in the mid-80’s. I was devastated as states began raising the drinking age to 21 in response to the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984. As a senior in high school already enlisted in the military; I was aghast at the thought of being old enough to fight yet considered not mature enough to drink. A few years later activated for the first Gulf War and pulled mid-semester from college many of my fellow soldiers found themselves facing overseas wartime deployment, yet denied the right to partake in even a farewell toast. At the time it seemed ridiculous.
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