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The real debate here is whether the projections used concerning traffic fatalities to compel the age change have proven accurate or not. Under the National Minimum Drinking Age Act of 1984, all states were to raise the legal drinking age to 21 or risk losing federal highway funds. By 1987, all states were compliant, which has given us over 20 years of data to make an educated decision about the correlation between legal drinking age and highway fatalities related to drinking.

According to a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration publication 1, traffic fatalities for people under 21 dropped by 43% during the years 1987 through 1996. This should be seen in context of a 28% drop in alcohol-related fatalities in the general population, according to the same publication. Although this may seem definitive, it is not.

The data collected on automobile accidents is often subjective, based on emergency response personnel documentation, causing data validity concerns. Also, other factors such as earliest driving age, legal age to purchase alcohol, economics, and other factors could also contribute to the decrease in highway fatalities.

The more refined question to ask is, What are we trying to address with this law? The answer is that we are trying to address fatalities while driving. There has been no substantial research finding that those 18-21 are more likely to drive while intoxicated that those over 21, so we should address the issue directly without unnecessarily limited freedoms. The issue at hand is whether one can legally drink, limits the number that actually do drink and therefore the number that drive while intoxicated.

It's my opinion that the data is not definitive in either direction and a correlation has not been established that we can reliably base the raised age on. Given the social acceptance of drinking after high school, it would seem to me that law enforcement efforts to stop drinking below 21 are ineffective. The idea that a college student who is inclined to drink would not start drinking until their junior year, seems far fetched and any effort to police that policy would be a waste of resources.

Drinking at age 18 does not cause increased fatality. Drinking irresponsible and driving at any age increases fatalities. I have not seen any evidence that an intoxicated driver at 18 is any less dangerous that one at 21. This is what really needs to be addressed.

Stiff penalties for drinking while driving will reduce fatalities, as we have seen a 28% drop as cited above, for all aged drivers. Increasing penalties for those under 21 would help control the increased risk associated with age and inexperience specifically with driving, without limiting the right to drink as an adult.

Therefore, since drinking at 18 does not in itself cause increased fatalities, lowering the age alone will not increase fatalities on the highway. I do believe that the laws surrounding intoxicated driving should be revisited in some states and those that drink irresponsibly and drive should be penalized with removal of driving privileges. In contrast, removing drinking privileges from 18 to 21 is nearly impossible to enforce effectively and unrelated to the desired result of reducing highway fatalities.

1 National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration/FARS (7/ 23/97). Compiled by The Century Council, 1201 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Suite 300, Washington, D.C. 20004. 21.

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