Columbus, OH — On Wednesday, The Buckeye Institute filed a supplemental brief in Ream v. U.S. Department of Treasury—its case seeking to overturn the federal ban on home distilling—in response to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ordering the government to address the constitutional claims at stake.

“During oral argument last month, the government refused to address the constitutional issues The Buckeye Institute raised in this important case even after receiving a letter from the court advising that the government should be prepared to do so,” said Robert Alt, president and chief executive officer of The Buckeye Institute and one of the lead attorneys on the case. “And now the government has advanced a stunningly broad concept of federal power at odds with the basic structure of the Constitution.”

The day after oral argument, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit sent a second letter directing “the government to file… a supplemental brief not to exceed 5,000 words… addressing the merits of the plaintiff’s constitutional claims.” The government filed its brief on January 7, and The Buckeye Institute’s new supplemental brief responds to the government’s attempted justification of the home-distilling ban.

“Under the government’s theory, Congress could regulate or even ban the most mundane domestic activities—including home cooking, baking, gardening, and occasionally babysitting neighbor kids,” said Andrew M. Grossman, a senior legal fellow at The Buckeye Institute and a partner in BakerHostetler’s Washington, D.C., office, who presented Buckeye’s argument as a lead attorney in the case. “This is precisely the sort of ‘police power’ the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized is reserved to the states and denied to the federal government.”

Before they were married, John Ream’s wife, Kristin, gifted him with a home brewing kit. After experimenting with home brewing for nearly 10 years, Mr. Ream turned his hobby into his own American Dream. The Reams opened Trek Brewing Company in Newark, Ohio. Since 2017, this family-owned business has grown into a community gathering place that, through the Trek Community Fund, actively supports local organizations that make the area a better place to live. Now, Mr. Ream, a former Boeing engineer, would like to try distilling small quantities of alcohol in his own home for his own personal consumption. However, the federal government threatens Mr. Ream with years in federal prison and thousands of dollars in fines if he were to do so.

Read more about The Buckeye Institute’s case and stay up-to-date on its progress at: BuckeyeInstitute.org/ReamvUSTreasury.

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