Starting July 1, Coloradans will be able to purchase liquor in stores on Sundays. The Rocky Mountain News reports:
With the stroke of a pen, Gov. Bill Ritter today signed into law a bill that makes Colorado the 35th state to permit liquor stores to open Sunday.
“This is a law whose time has finally come,” Ritter said in a statement. “The ban on Sunday sales was an antiquated law that long ago outlived its usefulness or relevance.” …
The new law came about after liquor store owners dropped their long-standing opposition to Sunday sales.
They made the switch to head off legislation that would have allowed grocery and convenience stores to sell full-strength beer and wine. Lawmakers killed that bill in the face of strong opposition from liquor store owners.
So Colorado continues to suffer from a host of political controls on the liquor industry. Liquor stores can’t sell food, and grocery stores can’t sell anything but 3.2 beer (except in one location per chain). Nor can liquor stores start chains. Also, Sunday car sales continue to be illegal.
But we can buy bottled booze on Sundays. It’s not much, but it’s something. So, thank you Democrats. While many political issues are arcane and confusing, this one is simple and obvious to the common person. During all of its years in the majority, the Republicans did nothing but fight for the Blue Laws against the interests and liberty of consumers. On this issue, the Republicans left it to the Democrats to score one for economic liberty.
April 18 Update: Penn Pfiffner writes:
In your recent blog dealing with a step toward rolling back the Blue Laws, you said:
“During all of its years in the majority, the Republicans did nothing but fight for the Blue Laws against the interests and liberty of consumers. On this issue, the Republicans left it to the Democrats to score one for economic liberty.”
True, in that the legislature never acted successfully through those years. I wanted to bring to your attention, however, that I offered legislation to end the Sunday prohibition on both liquor sales and car sales. The Republican-majority Business Affairs Committee killed the bill. If memory serves, this was sometime during the 59th General Assembly (1993 or 1994).
I appreciate Pfiffner’s clarification and his work in the legislature and out.
I was referring to Republicans as a party, not to individual Republicans who sided with economic liberty.