LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) -- A federal judge has struck down Kentucky's seven-decade-old ban on grocery stores, gas stations, and other retailers selling wine and liquor, but stopped enforcement of the ruling while other related issues are resolved.
U.S. District Judge John G. Heyburn II said not allowing some stores to get wine and liquor licenses, but granting them to others, is a violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution.
Heyburn said in a nine-page opinion issued Monday, the state legislature "wanted to limit liquor sales generally ... and it did so by arbitrarily distinguishing grocers from all other retailers" when the law was adopted.
A Louisville convenience store and the Food with Wine Coalition challenged the ban in a lawsuit filed in federal court in 2011.
