Brewer Urges Look at Merits of Home Distilling Ban Challenge

An Ohio brewer told a federal appeals court that he has standing to challenge a federal ban on home distilling because he would have engaged in the activity if the law didn’t exist.

In a brief filed Monday with the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, John Ream pushed back against the US government’s assertion that he didn’t prove there was an actual or perceived threat of future harm because he wasn’t likely to be prosecuted.

His lack of experience in distilling “small quantities of alcohol” doesn’t equate to a lack of evidence that he wasn’t serious about taking it up, Ream said.

The Treasury Department’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau enforces Section 5601(a)(6) and Section 5178, which ban distilleries from operating in homes, sheds, yards, and many other kinds of buildings. The ban, which dates to the Reconstruction era, punishes violations with up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.

A similar challenge is on appeal at the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit after a federal trial judge in Texas determined the ban was outside the federal government’s tax authority under the US Constitution.

Ream argues the home distilling ban falls outside the federal government’s constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce, and the government hasn’t identified a federal guideline of interstate commerce that the ban supports. A federal court in Ohio dismissed his case for lack of standing.

He said it was “astonishing” that the government is focusing on his standing to sue while dodging a serious discussion of the merits of his case.

“Given standing doctrine’s focus on the need to resolve real-world disputes, the government’s position that Mr. Ream’s standing turns on the hypothetical likelihood that he would be prosecuted in a counter-factual scenario where he violates the federal home-distilling prohibition is passing strange,” the brief says.

Baker & Hostetler LLP and the Buckeye Institute represent Ream.

The case is Ream v. Dep’t of the Treasury, 6th Cir., No. 25-03259, reply brief filed 9/15/25.