History of Drunk Driving Laws
The first jurisdiction in the United States of America to adopt laws against drunk driving was New York in 1910, with California and others following. Early laws simply prohibited driving while intoxicated, requiring proof of a state of intoxication with no specific definition of what level of inebriation qualified. The first generally-accepted legal BAC limit was 0.15%.
In 1938, the American Medical Association created a "Committee to Study Problems of Motor Vehicle Accidents". At the same time, the National Safety Council set up a "Committee on Tests for Intoxication".
In the US, most of the laws and penalties were greatly enhanced starting in the late 1970s, and through the 1990s, largely due to pressure from groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) and Students Against Destructive Decisions (SADD) and leaders like Candy Lightner. Significantly, zero tolerance laws were enacted which criminalized driving a vehicle with 0.01% or 0.02% BAC for drivers under 21. This is true even in Puerto Rico, despite maintaining a legal drinking age of 18.
Read more about this topic: Drunk Driving In The United States
Famous quotes containing the words history of, history, drunk, driving and/or laws:
“Three million of such stones would be needed before the work was done. Three million stones of an average weight of 5,000 pounds, every stone cut precisely to fit into its destined place in the great pyramid. From the quarries they pulled the stones across the desert to the banks of the Nile. Never in the history of the world had so great a task been performed. Their faith gave them strength, and their joy gave them song.”
—William Faulkner (1897–1962)
“The only history is a mere question of one’s struggle inside oneself. But that is the joy of it. One need neither discover Americas nor conquer nations, and yet one has as great a work as Columbus or Alexander, to do.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“Political correctness is driving machismo underground and recalling effeminacy from exile.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“Between married persons, the cement of friendship is by the laws supposed so strong as to abolish all division of possessions: and has often, in reality, the force ascribed to it.
”
—David Hume (1711–1776)