Whiskey Boys and Watermellon Army: Tax Protests on the Pennsylvania Frontier

Beginning in 1791, farmers in western Pennsylvania protested the new whiskey tax, an excise on distilled spirits imposed by the federal Congress.  Resistant grew into a rebellion that, by 1794, instigated an armed confrontation with the national government.  To suppress the uprising, President George Washington himself led a 13,000-man army into the field.  The Whiskey Rebellion was more than a battle about taxes — it was nothing less than a contest over the meaning of the American Revolution!