Dumbing Down Wine

A recent battle in my home state of Massachusetts made me think about where and how I like to buy wine. The issue is one many states face: whether to allow some or all grocery and big-box stores to sell wine and beer. In Massachusetts, owners of wine and liquor stores—quaintly called “package stores” (you carry the alcohol out in packages, rather than consume it on the premises)—may hold no more than three licenses.

Whole Foods, for example, can sell wine at only three of its seventeen Massachusetts stores. Naturally, it doesn’t like this. Neither do other grocery-chain owners like Stop & Shop and Star Market, which put $2 million into promoting a Massachusetts ballot initiative this fall to loosen restrictions on wine sales. Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, and other big-box stores are in favor of similar initiatives in other states. Opponents of the Massachusetts initiative (whose outcome, as of this ...