Rum-running
illegal business of smuggling alcoholic beverages
Rum-running, or bootlegging, is the illegal business of smuggling alcoholic beverages where such transportation is forbidden by law. Smuggling circumvents alcohol taxes and outright prohibition of alcohol sales.
Alcohol smuggling today
In the United States, the smuggling of alcohol did not end with the repeal of prohibition. In the Appalachian United States, for example, the demand for moonshine was at an all-time high in the 1920s, but an era of rampant bootlegging in dry areas continued into the 1970s. Bootlegging still exists, even if on a smaller scale. The state of Virginia has reported that it loses up to $20 million a year from illegal whiskey smuggling.
The Government of the United Kingdom fails to collect an estimated £900 million in taxes due to alcohol smuggling activities.
Absinthe was smuggled into the United States until it was legalized in 2007. Cuban rum is also sometimes smuggled into the United States, circumventing the embargo in existence since 1960.
Etymology
The Oxford English Dictionary records the word-form "bootlegger" as in use from 1889 onwards.
The public source identifies “Rum-running” as illegal business of smuggling alcoholic beverages. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Rum-running, illegal and business.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1977245. The Library of Congress control number is sh2018000034. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2007, 1960 and 1889.
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This entry incorporates text from “Rum-running” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.