A local brewery is suing the state of Pennsylvania over what it describes as “discriminatory” laws that severely limit the amount of beer it can sell directly to consumers in the state.
Urban Artifact, a popular Northside brewery that specializes in fruit-based beers, filed a federal lawsuit late last month in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania contesting volume restrictions on out-of-state brewers that are not applied to breweries based in the state.
Pennsylvania state officials have not yet responded to the lawsuit filed on July 29. An email sent to The Pennsylvania Attorney General’s office was not immediately returned for comment.
An email sent to the Pennsylvania Beer Alliance, one of the largest trade groups in the state made up of franchised beer wholesalers licensed by the state, also was not immediately returned for comment.
What the Pennsylvania beer law says
In Pennsylvania, out-of-state brewers are permitted to ship no more than 90 ounces of beer − just under eight, 12-ounce bottles − directly to individual consumers each month.
Meanwhile, the state’s own breweries can ship beer directly to Pennsylvanians without limits on quantity.
Urban Artifact, which already sells beer in Pennsylvania in liquor stores and other retail outlets, could avoid the quantity restrictions if it used a Pennsylvania distributor.
But hiring a distributor for individual sales to consumers would make it so costly to ship Urban Artifact’s beers that they would be cost-prohibitive for most customers, Scotty Hunter, the brewery’s co-owner, told The Enquirer.
“We’ve had our beer distributed by traditional means in Pennsylvania for years, and we have a lot of fans,” said Hunter, whose brewery’s labels include Gadget and Capy Snacks. “We just want the same access that they (Pennsylvania officials) allow in-state brewers.”
Similar laws about wine declared unconstitutional
Jeff Jennings, an attorney with California-based Pacific Legal Foundation representing Urban Artifact, said Pennsylvania’s beer regulations “kneecap” out-of-state breweries to protect in-state breweries from competition.
“Subjecting small businesses like Urban Artifact to additional, burdensome regulation simply because of their geographic location is discriminatory,” Jennings said in a statement.
Jennings said the lawsuit is based on a 2005 U.S. Supreme Court decision dealing with wineries.
In a 5-4 decision in the case, Granholm v. Heald, the Supreme Court ruled that laws in New York and Michigan that permitted in-state wineries to ship wine directly to consumers but prohibited out-of-state wineries from doing the same were unconstitutional.
The Constitution’s Commerce Clause prohibits states from discriminating against out-of-state businesses in a way that benefits in-state economic interests while burdening out-of-state businesses.
“We believe similar logic applies to state laws that burden out-of-state breweries by driving up their costs for selling beer,” Jennings told The Enquirer.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Northside’s Urban Artifact brewery sues neighboring state for access
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