Overview
The Whiskey Rebellion began with whiskey tax, which sparked a rebellion in West Pennsylvania that involved over 7,000 insurrectionists, lasting from 1791 to 1794. President George Washington responded to the rebellion by sending a 12,000 soldiers to Pennsylvania to confront the rebels, who disbanded without a single shot fired. The Whiskey Rebellion marked the first major challenge to federal authority in the young United States.
What Caused the Whiskey Rebellion?
Freedom from British rule had not come cheap; each colony had accrued significant debt during the Revolutionary War that remained on the books when the colonies became part of the United States. In his First Report on the Public Credit in 1790, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton argued for the “assumption” of this $25 million in outstanding debt by the Federal government. As long as the states held these debts, they would compete with the Federal government for both creditors’ dollars and for tax revenue. He faced stiff opposition in converting his plan into Congressional action, but eventually prevailed.
Hamilton also fought an uphill battle for an excise tax on whiskey. Taxes on commodities were an easy way to raise the money the government needed to pay the service on the debt and to provide much-needed revenue for basic government functions. President George Washington initially resisted Hamilton’s idea, but after a trip across southern Pennsylvania and northern Virginia in early 1791, where local officials assured him it was a good idea, he threw his support toward the excise bill. The First Congress passed the bill in the spring of 1791.
