Letter from Governor O’Malley to Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, Jr - Senate Bill 745


May 21, 2008

The Honorable Thomas V. Mike Miller, Jr.
President of the Senate
State House
Annapolis MD 21401

Dear Mr. President:

This year, the General Assembly – largely in response to the threat of a potential 16-fold increase in the tax rate that is currently being assessed on flavored malt beverages (“FMBs”)1 – overwhelmingly passed legislation to codify the decades-old practice of regulating and taxing FMBs as beer. 2

Today, I have made the difficult decision to allow Senate Bill 745 - Alcoholic Beverages - Definitions – Beer3 to go into effect without my signature pursuant to Article II, Section 17 of the Maryland Constitution. To understand my decision to allow this bill to go into effect without my signature, despite the concerns I and many others have about the problem of underage alcohol consumption, it is important to note what this bill does not do. This bill does not define FMBs as a separate category of alcohol. Nor does this bill change our statutory law to “downgrade” the status of FMBs from distilled spirits to beer, thereby reducing the cost of FMBs or making sales of FMBs more widely available.
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