Alcohol laws save lives
Michael Romano
junior
I can understand Juan Bernal's frustration, expressed in his Jan. 28 letter, with laws prohibiting alcohol to people under 21. They are hypocritical, but they are hardly sterile, worthless or counterproductive. Last year I might have made the same arguments as he made, but a little research convinced me otherwise.
The alcohol ban from ages 18 to 21 exists for one reason only: in the '80s, Mothers Against Drunk Driving campaigned for federal legislation establishing the drinking age at 21. Previously, the decision of the drinking age was left to the states and many, though not all, set the age at 18. MADD eventually won their fight, and though the federal government cannot constitutionally mandate a drinking age, it can deny highway funds to states that do not change the age to 21. Within a few years, all states had complied.
MADD had a very simple reason for pushing that legislation — they wanted to save lives. The 16-21 demographic, especially males, are statistically the most dangerous drivers, and though other age groups suffer from a high incidence of drunk driving deaths, such deaths were very prevalent in the 16-21 demographic. This especially offended MADD, who was apparently bothered more by the deaths of teenagers and young adults than by the deaths of older people.
The laws have worked. Since they took effect, underage drinking has declined, and more importantly, traffic fatalities have declined, especially among people between 16 and 21 years of age. This disproves Bernal's prohibition analogy and his claims that the laws actually motivate young people to drink more. While there is still much illegal drinking, people in this age bracket were more likely to drink before the hike in legal drinking age than they are now. They were also more likely to die in a traffic accident.
This also explains why the police are so intent on seemingly frivolous enforcement. If they do not enforce the drinking age, the laws will not fulfill their intended purpose — saving lives. This requires that they bust bars and ticket minors, even if those minors might not be driving; they must do so to deter those who would drive. When seen in this light, we can see that the enforcement is not hypocritical or without purpose, and that the police are not necessarily wasting resources.
Before I researched the issue, I thought drinking laws were unjust. Now that I am more informed, I see that they are just. This does not make the laws perfect. We might be able to reduce traffic fatalities without treating legal adults like children. For instance, though drunk driving was a big problem for those aged 16-21, it was also a problem for people, especially men, in their 20s and 30s. There is no reason that we should only focus on saving the lives of young people.
Then again, as Bernal pointed out, prohibition did not work and it would do no good to ban alcohol altogether. Perhaps if we allowed everyone over 18 or maybe even everyone to drink but enforced zero-tolerance driving laws across all ages, we could have the same positive effects from our laws without legal hypocrisy. Maybe this wouldn't work. I don't have the policy expertise to speculate and I wouldn't want to jump to conclusions. But in any event, the laws are there for good reason. It does no good to jump to conclusions and assume that, because we cannot see the reasons, lawmakers don't know what they're doing.
All Viewpoint Stories for Friday, January 31, 2003
