Actually, the Whiskey Rebellion was in 1792 and the tax collection was unenforceable -- as the Pennsylvanians knew -- because the roads were damned near non-existent. It was also a tax on the transportation of grain to market (25 bushels of corn are much harder to transport by horse than a couple small barrels of 180 proof whiskey, which would be cut to about 90 proof after sale. A gallon of "raw" whiskey sold, in 1810, for about 25 cents in Newport, Kentucky.) And there was no way to tell the difference between taxable and tax-paid whiskey.

At the end of the US Civil War a tax was again imposed upon whiskey, but then the transportation system was far, far better AND distillers were required to age the stuff in charred barrels -- making "red" whiskey and indicating that the tax had been paid.