The Tennessee Whiskey Law Feud of 2013

The Tennessee whiskey law feud began with a question about a name: should “Tennessee whiskey” identify a place of production, or also prescribe how the spirit must be made? A Tennessee state law effective from 1 July 2013 imposed production standards, including new charred oak barrels and maple charcoal filtration, with an exception to the filtration rule for one qualifying distillery. The public battle over those requirements erupted in 2014. Jack Daniel’s defended the standards, while opponents challenged their restrictiveness and an exception that benefited one distillery.[1][2][4][6][7]

What the Tennessee whiskey law required

Public Chapter No. 341, introduced as SB1195/HB1084, established the requirements and was codified as Tennessee Code Annotated § 57-2-106. It protected four names: “Tennessee Whiskey”, “Tennessee Whisky”, “Tennessee Sour Mash Whiskey” and “Tennessee Sour Mash Whisky”.[1][2]

The following table summarises the Tennessee state requirements in the supplied 2023 Code edition, checked against the site’s verified record in November 2026. The charcoal requirement has a specific exception, discussed below.[1]

The maple charcoal treatment is commonly called the Lincoln County Process. Its position in the sequence mattered: the statute specified filtration before ageing, rather than simply requiring some contact with charcoal.[1][3] The US standards of identity explain the federal categories alongside this Tennessee state law; the wider guide to whisky law places such rules in context.

The law also had enforcement provisions. A manufacturer breaching the section faced suspension or revocation of its licence for at least one year, while existing Tennessee permit holders received a 36 month window for product owned or contracted before 1 July 2013.[1]

This was not the first legal connection between Tennessee whiskey and bourbon. Contemporary reporting described earlier NAFTA era definitions as straight bourbon produced in Tennessee. In Canada, section B.02.022.1 of the Food and Drug Regulations used that formulation in the version in force from 22 March 2006 to 17 December 2024. These historical definitions should not be mistaken for present Canadian or trade agreement rules.[8][10]

Why the barrel rule became a corporate fight

According to Associated Press reporting, the 2013 law passed largely at the behest of Brown-Forman, the Louisville, Kentucky company that owned Jack Daniel’s. The Tennessean reported that it passed the General Assembly without opposition, rather than after the public confrontation that followed the next year.[4][6]

In 2014, Representative Bill Sanderson, a Republican from Kenton, brought forward legislation whose main change would allow Tennessee whiskey makers to reuse barrels. Sanderson said he introduced it at Diageo’s urging. Diageo owned George Dickel, made about 24 kilometres (15 miles) from Jack Daniel’s.[4][5][6]

That proximity gave the dispute an obvious rivalry, but the companies’ stated positions need separating from assumptions about their production plans. Diageo’s Guy L. Smith IV said all the company’s Tennessee whiskey was made with new oak. The proposal was therefore not evidence that George Dickel intended to switch to used barrels.[5][6]

Jack Daniel’s master distiller Jeff Arnett opposed the change and said the distillery would not consider reusing barrels. He described the proposal as “really more to weaken a title on a label that we’ve worked very hard for”. AP also noted that Jack Daniel’s barrels were made at a Brown-Forman plant.[6]

Smith framed the issue differently: “This is about Brown-Forman trying to stifle competition and the entrepreneurial spirit of micro distillers.” These were competing explanations of the legislation’s purpose, not independently established findings about either company’s motives.[6]

The story in the record

Story title: A shared name, rival rules

Origins (founding_story): Public Chapter No. 341 established Tennessee whiskey production requirements effective from 1 July 2013.[2]

Turning point: On 25 March 2014, House and Senate committees declined to amend the definition that session and sent the issue to summer study panels.[4]

Documented record: Arnett publicly opposed weakening the label’s requirements, while Smith publicly accused Brown-Forman of restricting competition.[6]

Sources and claim mapping: - Origins and effective date: University of Tennessee, Tennessee Public Acts 2013. - Committee decision and summer study: The Tennessean, 25 March 2014. - Arnett’s and Smith’s statements: Associated Press, 17 March 2014.

Last checked: 7 November 2026

Verdict badge

Claim: Arnett described the proposed change as weakening a title on a label.

Verdict: Documented

What the record shows: AP directly attributed that statement to Arnett in its contemporary account.[6]

Evidence against or gap: None found concerning that attribution in the supplied record.

Earliest known source: The earliest source identified in the fact sheet for this statement is AP’s report of 17 March 2014.

Sources: Associated Press, Whiskey wars whipping up on Tennessee’s horizon, 17 March 2014.

Last checked: 7 November 2026

Smaller producers did not form a single camp

The argument was not simply a large company defending regulation against smaller distillers opposing it. The Tennessean reported criticism from George Dickel, Prichard’s and Full Throttle, but Charles Nelson of Nelson’s Green Brier Distillery in Nashville supported keeping the standards.[4][6]

Other voices questioned what the rules meant for producers whose methods differed. Short Mountain Distillery’s Billy Kaufman asked what used barrel whiskey made in the state would be called: “Whiskey, made in Tennessee?” Lobbyist David McMahan, representing Dickel and Popcorn Sutton Distilling, likened the law to requiring all American beer to be made like Budweiser.[5][6]

Those objections concerned access to the name, rather than whether a producer could make a different spirit at all. Sanderson put the naming question directly: “What gives them the right to call theirs Tennessee whiskey, and not others?”[5]

The disagreement over taste was less readily settled. Diageo argued that the rules would make all Tennessee whiskey taste like Jack Daniel’s, while Brown-Forman presented the requirements as protection for the category. Neither position, as recorded here, amounts to comparative sensory evidence.[8][9]

What happened to the 2014 challenge?

On 25 March 2014, legislators opted not to amend the definition during that session. The Tennessean reported that Senator Mark Green of Clarksville, who introduced the Senate bill, moved it to summer study; House and Senate committees sent the question to study panels.[4]

Even the description of the attempted change was contested. AP and The Drinks Business reported Sanderson saying it would not repeal the 2013 law, whereas The Tennessean reported that he had proposed an amendment to revoke it. The safest description is a bid to change the definition, with barrel reuse its central reported production issue.[4][5][6]

Sanderson’s assessment of the previous year was blunt: “We overstepped our boundaries last year.” That statement helps explain the reversal in political tone between the unopposed passage reported in 2013 and the openly divided debate of 2014.[4]

The Prichard’s exception and its constitutional problem

Subsection (c) exempted a distillery from maple charcoal filtration if it stood in a county that authorised distilling by referendum in 1979 and was first licensed by the state in 2000. The Attorney General described the provision as applying to one distillery; AP identified it as Prichard’s.[1][3][7]

The exception created a practical distinction even within that business. AP reported that Prichard’s original site qualified, while its newer Nashville still did not. Phil Prichard objected that following the charcoal rule would mean “paying homage to Jack Daniel’s and not paying homage to my grandfather Benjamin Prichard”.[7]

On 18 March 2015, Tennessee Attorney General Opinion 15-23, requested by Sanderson, concluded that the exception violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and article XI, section 8 of the Tennessee Constitution.[3]

That conclusion was an Attorney General’s opinion, not a court judgment striking the provision from the statute. The supplied 2023 Code still prints subsection (c), with a history note citing the 2013 Act. AP also reported that the law lacked a severability clause, leaving uncertainty about whether a successful challenge to the exception would affect the wider law.[1][7]

The distinction matters when reading a short account of the feud: the opinion found the preferential exception unconstitutional, not the maple charcoal requirement itself. Saying simply that “the Tennessee whiskey law was struck down” would misrepresent the record supplied here.[1][3]

Where to go next

• US Standards of Identity for Whiskey: distinguish federal whiskey categories from this Tennessee state dispute.
• Whisky Law vs Industry Standards: What Is Binding: understand the difference between legislation and industry requirements.
• Whisky Law Around the World: The Complete Guide: place the Tennessee argument within the wider map of whisky regulation.

Sources

[1] Justia, 2023 Tennessee Code § 57-2-106: Restrictions on labeling of intoxicating liquors as Tennessee whiskeys, 2023 edition.
https://law.justia.com/codes/tennessee/2023/title-57/chapter-2/section-57-2-106/

[2] University of Tennessee, TRACE, Tennessee Public Acts 2013, 2013 compilation, Public Chapter No. 341.
https://trace.tennessee.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/baddfdd1-6b96-4f2a-a1ba-7a3243124929/content

[3] Tennessee Attorney General, Opinion No. 15-23, 18 March 2015.
https://www.tn.gov/content/dam/tn/attorneygeneral/documents/ops/2015/op15-23.pdf

[4] The Tennessean, Effort to rewrite Tennessee whiskey law fails, 25 March 2014.
https://www.tennessean.com/story/money/2014/03/25/effort-rewrite-tennessee-whiskey-law-fails/6868115/

[5] The Drinks Business, Jack Daniel’s fights Tennessee whiskey law, 2014 report.
https://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/2014/03/jack-daniels-fights-change-to-tennessee-whiskey-law/

[6] Associated Press via WPDE, Whiskey wars whipping up on Tennessee’s horizon, 17 March 2014, date supplied by the verified fact sheet.
https://wpde.com/news/politics/whiskey-wars-whipping-up-on-tennessees-horizon-08-13-2015-145202015

[7] Associated Press via KSL, Exemption in ‘Tennessee Whiskey’ law raises legal flags, publication date not reliably established in the fact sheet.
https://www.ksl.com/article/news/business/exemption-in-tennessee-whiskey-law-raises-legal-flags/33886270

[8] NBC News, from Entrepreneur, On the Rocks: Jack Daniel’s and Liquor Giant Diageo Feud Over ‘Tennessee Whiskey’, 18 March 2014.
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna54710706

[9] Harpers Wine & Spirit, Battle over Tennessee Bourbon whiskey intensifies, 20 March 2014.
https://harpers.co.uk/news/fullstory.php/aid/14741/Battle_over_Tennessee_Bourbon_whiskey_intensifies.html

[10] Justice Laws Website, Canada, Food and Drug Regulations, section B.02.022.1, historical version from 22 March 2006 to 17 December 2024.
https://www.laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/regulations/C.R.C.,_c._870/section-B.02.022.1-20060322.html

This article is desk research based on the supplied verified fact sheet, its legislative references and contemporary reporting, without first-hand reporting or tasting.

Last checked: November 2026