Just found this reading the new Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR)
TITLE 27--Alcohol, Tobacco Products and Firearms
(e-CFR) Data is current as of March 24, 2005
§ 29.57 Failure to register; penalty.
Any person having possession, custody, or control of any still or distilling apparatus set up who fails to register the still or distilling apparatus is subject to a fine of not more than $10,000 or imprisonment of not more than 5 years, or both, and the still or distilling apparatus is forfeitable to the Government.
that's kind of old news Bear.
In fact every violation of the tax code around unlicenced distilling reads almost the same.
been that way for years.
in 1975 I was hitching in british columbia and a dookaboor kid in a ford falcon that had been modified into a pickup with a cutting toorch and some mill ends and plastic sheeting stopped to give me a ride.
"Where ya goin eh?" he says.
"Nelson or Castlegar" say I, "either one, doesn't make a difference"
We ride on in silence for a minute and he comes out with:
"So they finally got that A-Bomb eh? Took em too long to use it on Hitler but they sure blew the dinks off them Japs eh?"
I thought about this for a second before replying:
"I guess news travels fast out here huh?"
"a woman who drives you to drink is hard to find, most of them will make you drive yourself."
anon--
but as i said, you can own a still in california without a permit and make fuel ethanol without a permit. you do need the federal permit but i hear it's not nearly as tough as a license to distill beverages.
in fact it's nowhere near the same procedure.
If only the best birds sang, the woods would be silent.
And the second that you go in to "register" your still you'll be arrested for making illegal booze. This is a lot like the Marijuana Tax Stamp that the '37(IIRC) proibition listed. Marijuana was prohibited BUT if you got a Tax Stamp(of which none were ever printed) then you could grow your weed, problem is weed was illegal so it was a catch 22. By law you're not allow to distill alcoholic beverages in the U.S. so registering your still is a moot point.
There are some States that allow the making of alcohol for fuel but you have to taint it so that it's undrinkable and get a permit to make it. Maybe in that case you'll need to register your still but to say that you have to register something that'll produce something that's illegal is just plain crazy.
