Use Slaughter, The Whiskey Rebellion, p. 148, and Veach, Kentucky Bourbon Whiskey, p. 12.
Because the excise allowed payment by output or still capacity, continuously operated stills could realize a lower effective gallon rate that small seasonal farm stills generally could not.
Verified against Slaughter, rendered PDF p. 155 / printed p. 148, and Veach, rendered PDF p. 25 / printed p. 12, on 2026-08-24.
The evidence supports unequal effect across scale and operating pattern; it does not prove a coordinated intention to eliminate small distillers.
Slaughter explains both payment options and why year-round utilization made the capacity option advantageous to larger producers.
Used and link-verified on the public history page “Revolution and the Early Republic — Rum, Whiskey, Taxation, and Federal Power” on 2026-09-02. Retain the recorded qualifications in future revisions.
The excise’s capacity option favored continuously operated stillsCapacity-based excise assessment penalized seasonal farmer-distillersSpoelman and Haskell — Dead Distillers — PDF sheets 43–46 — excise design and production scaleMiddleton — Excise policy shaped American distilling technology and scaleEvidence judgment
Slaughter explains the gallon-or-capacity structure and its utilization advantage; Veach independently describes the capacity-based assessment of seasonal rural stills and the resulting tax on production farmers would not make. Together they support the competitive-effect claim.
Qualification
The evidence establishes unequal operation across scale and production pattern. It does not, by itself, establish a coordinated intent to eliminate small distillers.
Drafting status
Ready for Drafting with both citations.