OK, can you really call somebody a moonshiner if he has a license?

[Brigid]

I'm watching "How the States Got Their Shapes" on H2, and there's this guy who makes moonshine just like his grandfather did-he even uses his grandfather's old still- but he isn't breaking the law because he has a license. Isn't that kind of missing the point?

[MiddleFingerMom]

1. I love words. My first thought was that moonshine referred to simply "home-distilled"...

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... without social context -- and moonshiner was simply an equivalent of home-brewer.
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Not the case -- from the Online Etymological Dictionary: Meaning "illicit liquor" is attested
from 1785 (earliest reference is to that smuggled on the coasts of Kent and Sussex).
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Moonshine was fairly easily acquired when I lived on the Kentucky-Tennessee border...
both the type almost everybody knows about -- the nearly pure alcohol at 180 proof
and above... and a weaker variety that was near the norm of 86 proof. It was fairly
expensive so it didn't make much sense unless you were an original-meaning
tea-partier and just didn't like paying taxes... but the weaker version REALLY didn't
make sense as it was still as rough-tasting as the stronger variety (at least to MY
"uncultured" palate).
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