There is a popularly mis-held assertion that you can distill a certain volume of spirits in the US every year without approval. This is wrong. You may brew beer, you may make wine, but you may not distill spirits in any volume without paying your taxes to the ATFE. I understand why people want to conflate spirits, beer and wine but wishful thinking doesn’t change the law.
I see this often on internet forums and it drives me nuts. The other bit of urban legend is that home distilled spirits will make you go blind. This is also not correct: distillation is a physical process, not a chemical one. You are not creating chemicals that were not there in the first place. Provided you don’t adulterate your mash with something, it won’t be in the finished product. As the starter material for most liqours is a beer or wine (think of moonshine as distilled sugar wine), you should be safe drinking the product. Please understand that ethyl alcohol is a poison, it just acts more slowly than other alcohols.
You may argue, and I agree, that the government has no legitimate interest in regulating production of alcohol for any purpose. Be that as it may, it is the law of the land that you cannot legally produce spirits in the US without paying taxes and obtaining permits. Don’t let your libertarian ideals land you in federal pound-you-in-the-ass prison.
There are examples which go the other direction, as well. It is perfectly legal at the federal level to manufacture your own firearms so long as you don’t sell them and don’t make one in a prohibited configuration (read this as a configuration which requires a tax other than excise tax to be paid). The advantage is that if you’re handy with a drill press and a vise, you can escape paying the excise tax on firearms purchases. I find that the investment in time is not worth the money, but this may not be true for you. Machine guns are legal for purchase at the federal level, as are sawed-off shotguns and suppressors. Possession and use varies state to state; in Washington, it is legal to buy a suppressor but it is illegal to use it.
Please ask the experts (ATFE, TTB) if you have questions on alcohol, tobacco, firearms, or explosives. Don’t trust me, I’m just some idiot on an internet forum.
