Legalize Drunk Driving

[Doug.38PR]

I have mixed feelings about this. I agree with him by and large. But if somebody is driving wrecklessly, regardless of the causes, they should be taken off the road not given a ticket.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/drunkdriving.html

Legalize Drunk Driving
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.



[Note: This column was written before the news came out last night that George W. Bush was arrested on a DUI charge 24 years ago. He was stopped in Maine for driving too slowly and briefly veering onto the shoulder of the road]

Clinton has signed a bill passed by Congress that orders the states to adopt new, more onerous drunk-driving standards or face a loss of highway funds. That’s right: the old highway extortion trick. Sure enough, states are already working to pass new, tighter laws against Driving Under the Influence, responding as expected to the feds’ ransom note.

Now the feds declare that a blood-alcohol level of 0.08 percent and above is criminal and must be severely punished. The National Restaurant Association is exactly right that this is absurdly low. The overwhelming majority of accidents related to drunk driving involve repeat offenders with blood-alcohol levels twice that high. If a standard of 0.1 doesn’t deter them, then a lower one won’t either.

But there’s a more fundamental point. What precisely is being criminalized? Not bad driving. Not destruction of property. Not the taking of human life or reckless endangerment. The crime is having the wrong substance in your blood. Yet it is possible, in fact, to have this substance in your blood, even while driving, and not commit anything like what has been traditionally called a crime.

What have we done by permitting government to criminalize the content of our blood instead of actions themselves? We have given it power to make the application of the law arbitrary, capricious, and contingent on the judgment of cops and cop technicians. Indeed, without the government’s "Breathalyzer," there is no way to tell for sure if we are breaking the law.

Sure, we can do informal calculations in our head, based on our weight and the amount of alcohol we have had over some period of time. But at best these will be estimates. We have to wait for the government to administer a test to tell us whether or not we are criminals. That’s not the way law is supposed to work. Indeed, this is a form of tyranny.

Now, the immediate response goes this way: drunk driving has to be illegal because the probability of causing an accident rises dramatically when you drink. The answer is just as simple: government in a free society should not deal in probabilities. The law should deal in actions and actions alone, and only insofar as they damage person or property. Probabilities are something for insurance companies to assess on a competitive and voluntary basis.

This is why the campaign against "racial profiling" has intuitive plausibility to many people: surely a person shouldn’t be hounded solely because some demographic groups have higher crime rates than others. Government should be preventing and punishing crimes themselves, not probabilities and propensities. Neither, then, should we have driver profiling, which assumes that just because a person has quaffed a few he is automatically a danger.

In fact, driver profiling is worse than racial profiling, because the latter only implies that the police are more watchful, not that they criminalize race itself. Despite the propaganda, what’s being criminalized in the case of drunk driving is not the probability that a person driving will get into an accident but the fact of the blood-alcohol content itself. A drunk driver is humiliated and destroyed even when he hasn’t done any harm.

Of course, enforcement is a serious problem. A sizeable number of people leaving a bar or a restaurant would probably qualify as DUI. But there is no way for the police to know unless they are tipped off by a swerving car or reckless driving in general. But the question becomes: why not ticket the swerving or recklessness and leave the alcohol out of it? Why indeed.

To underscore the fact that it is some level of drinking that is being criminalized, government sets up these outrageous, civil-liberties-violating barricades that stop people to check their blood – even when they have done nothing at all. This is a gross attack on liberty that implies that the government has and should have total control over us, extending even to the testing of intimate biological facts. But somehow we put up with it because we have conceded the first assumption that government ought to punish us for the content of our blood and not just our actions.

There are many factors that cause a person to drive poorly. You may have sore muscles after a weight-lifting session and have slow reactions. You could be sleepy. You could be in a bad mood, or angry after a fight with your spouse. Should the government be allowed to administer anger tests, tiredness tests, or soreness tests? That is the very next step, and don’t be surprised when Congress starts to examine this question.

Already, there’s a move on to prohibit cell phone use while driving. Such an absurdity follows from the idea that government should make judgments about what we are allegedly likely to do.

What’s more, some people drive more safely after a few drinks, precisely because they know their reaction time has been slowed and they must pay more attention to safety. We all know drunks who have an amazing ability to drive perfectly after being liquored up. They should be liberated from the force of the law, and only punished if they actually do something wrong.

We need to put a stop to this whole trend now. Drunk driving should be legalized. And please don’t write me to say: "I am offended by your insensitivity because my mother was killed by a drunk driver." Any person responsible for killing someone else is guilty of manslaughter or murder and should be punished accordingly. But it is perverse to punish a murderer not because of his crime but because of some biological consideration, e.g. he has red hair.

Bank robbers may tend to wear masks, but the crime they commit has nothing to do with the mask. In the same way, drunk drivers cause accidents but so do sober drivers, and many drunk drivers cause no accidents at all. The law should focus on violations of person and property, not scientific oddities like blood content.

There’s a final point against Clinton’s drunk-driving bill. It is a violation of states rights. Not only is there is no warrant in the Constitution for the federal government to legislate blood-alcohol content – the 10th amendment should prevent it from doing so. The question of drunk driving should first be returned to the states, and then each state should liberate drunk drivers from the force of the law.

November 3, 2000

Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. [send him mail] is president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, editor of LewRockwell.com and author of Speaking of Liberty.

Copyright © 2000 LewRockwell.com

[jfrey123]

This guy is off his rocker. In my humble opinion, anyone who supports him or this idea must've bumped their head... HARD!


Our government also denys you the right to carry C-4 on an airplane based on the "probability" that you may decided to blow it out of the sky. But our government shouldn't deal in probability...

[Redneckrepairs]

IMHO ok lets leagalize drunk driveing , but lets at the same time prohibit drunk posting on the internet LOL .

[newerguy]

Drunk driving is illegal because you're engaging an a dangerous behavior that puts others at risk for no good reason. It's the same as reckless driving, a person driving recklessly hasn't caused any harm yet, but they are likely to do so. That's dealing in probabilities, but its perfectly acceptable for the government to do so. There is no reason why the government can't deal with probabilities. They do so all the time, look at building codes, consumer products regulation, or pharmacuticals. Bad wiring is more likely to start a fire, smalll toys are more likely to choke a child, and some new drugs pose a risk (meaning probability) of causing more harm than good. Its all about the odds.

So what's drunk? In NY, you get there two ways, either being in an intoxicated state (meaning you convince a jury he was drunk, but drunk doesn't mean anything specific), or you have a blood alcohol standard that can be scientifically tested. Which do you feel better with?

There are two problems with the current law. First, I agree that, with DWI penalties so high is many states (NY included), 0.08 is too low. If you want an offense in between .05 (driving while ability impaired by alcohol) and 0.10 (DWI), then we can talk about that, but the current penalties for 0.08 are high in my opinion, especially when you look at the accident statistics at BACs below 0.10. Second, the problem with the per se intoxication standards in general are you have a criminal sanction for a behavior (driving with a BAC above the legal limit), which the average person cannot know whether they are committing without a chemical test. You are not likely to know whether you are above the limit, or whether you can have one more drink before you drive. Now, if you just leave it at "an intoxicated state" you are no better off, because a person's ability to tell if they are drunk is impaired by their drinking. DWI laws are tough. There's a lot more politics to it than science or reason. Sometimes I think they should require bars to have breath test machines so people can test themselves. MADD opposes those machines because they are worried people will either try and get as high a BAC as they can (like a drinking game) or drink up until they are right at the limit (when they would have otherwise left without having another).

I don't know what the answer is, but this guy's got it wrong. Drinking and driving puts people at risk for no good reason. The government should punish that. How they measure whether you are drunk or not is a problem, and while I don't like the current system, I don't have anything better.

[TheFacts]

Now, the immediate response goes this way: drunk driving has to be illegal because the probability of causing an accident rises dramatically when you drink. The answer is just as simple: government in a free society should not deal in probabilities. The law should deal in actions and actions alone, and only insofar as they damage person or property. Probabilities are something for insurance companies to assess on a competitive and voluntary basis.

Very good point. His point of view is analogous to the following anti-gun preach: Leaving a loaded gun in your house with small children present greatly increases the probability of an accidental shooting. With our libertarian dogma, we would find this statement to be absurd. Nevertheless, this is a demonstration of probabilities and statistics and, like opinions, they can be manipulated and configured to acheive convienent answers. Before we judge the above article too harshly, maybe we should evaluate our own notions about liberty and free will a little more closely.

By the way, for the record, I find drunk driving reprehensible!!!!!



Curiosity yields evolution...satiety yields extinction.

[HiPowering Along]

I'll let anyone have the podium to pontificate legalization of drunk driving when they've pulled a bloodied, broken body of a relative that's been hit head on while coming home from a grocery store by a drunk driver.

After the body has been pulled out of the vehicle and pronounced dead, come with me and inform the parents at 0400 in the morning that their daughter is now dead because some damned idiot didn't have the common sense to not down "just a few beers, Offizer", and snuff out a promising life.

Let me give you a fast clue on the above: (1) it ain't pretty, and (2) it is absolutely senseless.

Legalize drunk driving, my left ear. Death and disability from drunk driving is the #1 preventable trauma in this country. If the damn drunks only took out themselves, hey, let Darwin's Theory operate at full steam. But drunk drivers don't do that. They kill innocent folks with far too great a regularity.

And it sometimes doesn't even take it to .08 to do it. Impairment starts at the first drink.

Legalize drunk driving - no flaming way. That statement makes about as much sense as making any and all firearms illegal.

And in the spirit of "full public disclosure", I'm permanently saddled with a paritial mobility disability due to some damned drunk that got behind the wheel.

[TheBluesMan]

If a standard of 0.1 doesn’t deter them, then a lower one won’t either.

This is completely wrong. I know dozens of people who used to think nothing of having a drink or three (or four) at a restaurant, then driving home. These folks now use a designated driver *all the time*. Their reason - the new, tougher law.

I do agree with Rockwell that this is not within the power of the FedGov to legislate - it should be left to the states. That said, I think the standard for DUI in my state should be the same as it is for me when I'm carrying a firearm. 0.000%.

Guns and alcohol don't mix, neither do cars and booze.

-Dave

[GoSlash27]

I'll take the bait and voice support for this point of view. What does a BAC reading prove other than the alcohol content of your blood? And I'm talking a hospital-administered blood test, not a breathalyzer (which is a whole 'nother can of worms).
If someone is pulled over for reckless driving...charge them with reckless driving! Why mess around adding stiffer penalties based on exactly why they were driving recklessly?
Now, I have never driven drunk. But I have been in two accidents. One at the hands of a little old lady who had just had cataract surgery and had no business being on the road, and the other who rear-ended me at a stop light while distracted by a carload of kids and a cell phone. Why should they get penalized less for trying to kill me than the drunk guy who hasn't hit me?

And I'm not exaggerating. That little old lady could have easily killed me.

Different people have different physiological reactions to different BAC levels. There's no one single BAC that you can point at and say "that dude's drunk". Some people can drive just fine with an illegal alcohol content, whereas some people are a menace even when stone-sober.

No. If we are to write laws against the behaviors we don't want while retaining our liberties (not to mention making effective laws) we need to be criminalizing behavior rather than objects and circumstances. If you're driving recklessly I want to throw the book at you. If you injure me in the process you should be severely punished.
But I couldn't care less exactly *why* you were driving like a dips&*t.

[GoSlash27]

I'll let anyone have the podium to pontificate legalization of drunk driving when they've pulled a bloodied, broken body of a relative that's been hit head on while coming home from a grocery store by a drunk driver.

I'll let anyone have the podium to pontificate legalization of concealed carry when they've pulled a bloodied, ventilated body of a relative that's been shot while coming home from a grocery store by an armed maniac.

Get the idea? Emotion-based arguments get no quarter with me.

[DWARREN123]

Why would anyone wish to drive impaired by any substance. It is dangerous and foolish to consider that you may or may not hurt yourself or others. Like playing with a firearm, not knowing if it is loaded or not.

[allenomics]

In the wrong hands, vehicles are unguided missiles. Driving while under the influence is not responsible behavior under any circumstance. It becomes a killing machine that costs innocent victims far too much pain, suffering and loss.

[GoSlash27]

Driving while under the influence is not responsible behavior under any circumstance

Neither is driving while blind or driving while looking the wrong way while yammering into a cell phone. Why is one irresponsible behavior punished more severely than another?

I thought we were all about "personal responsibility"??

Wouldn't it make more sense to say "if you hurt someone while driving like an imbecile, that's your a$$" rather than criminalizing behaviors that may or may not lead to hurting someone?

[TheBluesMan]

GoSlash - Would you allow your child to go hunting with a bunch of your drunk cousins?

[Number 6]

Neither is driving while blind or driving while looking the wrong way while yammering into a cell phone. Why is one irresponsible behavior punished more severely than another?

First, no-one is suggesting that those actions are NOT reckless and irresponsible.

Second, driving while blind is illegal in ALL states; babbling on a cell phone IS illegal in some states already and likely to become so in more states.

Third and last,the likelihood of a significant accident while driving drunk is far greater than either of the activities you seek you rationalize drunk driving with.

Got any serious reasons why drunk driving should be condoned?

[SecDef]

GoSlash - Would you allow your child to go hunting with a bunch of your drunk cousins?

I know MY children are not allowed to hunt with Cheney!


BTW, what is the overlap for people that support legalizing drunk driving and not smoking dope?

[RedneckFur]

Number 6 .. I dont have a link or source to back this up, but I've read and seen on many occasions that talking on a cell phone while driving is just as reckless as being mildly intoxicated.

In the past I've ridden in cars with people on cell phones, and people that have had a few drinks. And i can say with all honesty the most reckless and dangerous driver i've ever ridden with was a multi-tasking business professional who was on the cell phone the entire time he was on the road.

I think if we were to remove the penalty for being drunk while driving, more people would drive drunk.. so it would not be a good idea to do that... I do however think that reckless driving should be punished equally, regardless of wether its a cell phone, screaming kids, or 3 beers.

[qlajlu]

And what about the pilot that slides into the seat behind the yoke of a 747? Do you really want him at the controls of this mammoth aircraft when he has been drinking after all the science research on the subject of reduced response because of alcohol consumption shows without a doubt that it is a real thing?

If you do then all I can say is that I strongly disagree with you my friend. I came from a family where the old man always had to have his drink and all it would take is one for him to become aggressive. It was the same when he drove a car. No thank you. I value my life and my family's lives too much.

[michibilly]

I agree with Goslash and the article 100 % Also I know its probably
a sin to admit here but Ive shot guns with people who have been drinking and I didnt have a worry in the world. I think it really depends on how sharp the person is in general. Theres people I feel safe around regardless of what they are on and theres people I dont feel safe around stone cold sober.


If driving drunk is against the law becuase of what could happen than its only a matter of time before the govt finds more things they can apply that logic too.

[massman]

It is preposterous to even think of legalizng drunk dirving. Having said that, I do have a problem with the 0.08 as the bar set for a DUI charge. In the 80's I was working in the Boston area and was staying with friends in the Framingham area. I remember seeing a story on the news re: a guy who was stopped for having a tail light out. When the trooper questioned the guy he smelled of alcohol so whe was arrested. At that time the Mass State Police were video taping DUI sobriety tests with the belief that when most people saw how they did they would not fight the charge in court. Well, this 300 lb guy takes the test after blowing a 0.28, then sees it the following morning and calles his lawyer. When the lawyer sees it he believes the breathalyzer must be broken. A check shows it is working perfectly. They go to court, show the jury the video and the guy gets off because he WAS NOT UNDER THE INFLUENCE!
In Western Mass the state police held demonstrations for the press where people volunteered to drive an obstacal course while timed, first w/o any drinks, than after having several drinks. Most did much poorer after cocktails, however one guy did much better after having 5 shots of vodka in 1/2 hour and beating his time with no drinks. The state cop's response was "well he is a big man and absorbs alcohol better" despite his breath test reading of 0.19. My point is that under the influence SHOULD mean under the influence rather than some number the fed's came up with. By the way, the Mass State Police stopped using the video sobriety tests becasue so many people got off. And this was before MA adopted the 0.08 limit for DUI.

[GoSlash27]

Number 6,
I do not seek to condone any form of vehicular stupidity. What I'm saying is that when we begin to criminalize behaviors that may or may not lead to unwanted consequences, we end up losing sight of the point of the exercise and begin to create ineffective law. Legislation via emotion rather than reason.

Look at it this way: The cop is busy staking out the local bar at 2:00. He pulls over a guy who passes the field sobriety test but blows a .09. Meanwhile I'm 2 blocks away bleeding in the street because I just got run over by some jackass who knowingly attempted to operate a vehicle with faulty brakes.

The law against drunk driving didn't serve the purpose of curbing vehicular manslaughter in my case, now did it?

Creating laws to outlaw certain contributing factors merely serves to condone other contributing factors by omission. We are in agreement that reducing vehicular manslaughter is good for society; a genuine need.
So rather than screwing around with potential contributing factors and playing "nanny state", why not just place personal responsibility back in the hands of the citizen and simply say " if you knowingly operate a vehicle in an impaired state and it results in the death of another citizen, you will get the needle".

That'd force people to not want to risk driving drunk, hang up their cell phones, *and* think twice about driving when they can't see 4 feet in front of their nose.
Drunk driving laws only serve (ineffectively I might add) one of the potential thousands of contributing factors.

[Rangefinder]

Consider how much money is made by the local and state from DUI's... It's practically their most profitable law (especially here in Utah--where they actively hunt anyone who they think might have been in close proximity of alcohol at some point in their lifetime). Do I agree with drunk driving? No. But I also don't agree with the extent of laws that will convict a person who is .09 in their driveway getting home for the night after a christmas party, and potentially destroy the next 10 years of their life based on the idea of "probability" he might have caused harm. Happened to a good friend of mine last december, and it's been interesting to see how things appear from the other side of the ruling. Violent crime deserves harsh penalties. Dui laws as they are currently seem to be more of a way to manufacture criminals out of otherwise good, honest people and bring lots of easy money into the state and local departments.

[GoSlash27]

TBM,
I see what you're driving at, but your argument is also an appeal to emotion. My cousins don't hunt and my "child" could serve to teach them a thing or three about firearm safety if they did.

To answer your question, no. But neither would he and there's more stupidity around firearms than just the alcohol-induced variety. That's *my* point.
Yeah. Stupid drunk behavior with firearms is not to be encouraged, but neither is stupid sober behavior.

[TheBluesMan]

My argument isn't an appeal to emotion, simply a logical decision. Regardless, you answered the question.

Originally Posted by GoSlash27

...there's more stupidity around firearms than just the alcohol-induced variety. That's *my* point.

And a good point it is! Now if I may ask a follow up question: Does alcohol have any effect on such stupidity? Does it intensify or diminish the effect?

It's called impairment. Some people are naturally impared even when stone sober. I wouldn't go shooting with them or let them drive my kids around. I can think of an old codger I know that fits this description. Now if you put a couple of beers into that old codger, will he be safer or more dangerous behind a wheel or a trigger?

You say that stupid, drunk behavior with firearms isn't to be encouraged, but you apparently believe that encouraging stupid, drunk behavior with automobiles is a fine idea.

There's a disconnect there that I don't understand.

[Fn-P9]

What would make you more mad? To be T-Boned by a drunk or sober driver. In a way, IMHO, the sober would make it worse. At least the drunk has an excuse. I'm serious. I really enjoyed reading that article but it is a bad and wrong idea to drive drunk. There is a time and place to do things. Choose wisely.

Hey, I even think that we should legalize marijuana. That should also be a crime to smoke that and drive. but, I do start to sit on the fence when .gov gets into every facet of life eg. talking on cell phone or eating while driving.

TWO HANDS ON STEERING WHEEL AND PAY ATTENTION. I ONLY WANT TO GET HOME WITH OUT GETTING SLAMMED INTO FOR ANY REASON

[Apple a Day]

Okay, how many of those advocating the legalization of drunk driving have already been pulled over for DUI? I'm starting a pool.
Knowing that the roads are full of idiots, kids with cell phones, and near-deads who can't see over the steering wheels why in the world would you want to ruin your reflexes by drinking before you get behind the wheel...or shooting? If you do they you're a [censored] idiot. No amount of whining or legal wheedling will change that.
If you're trying to justify driving drunk then maybe you should examine the possibility that you're in the denial phase of an addiction.