UPDATE: I TOLD YOU SO.
"Police struggle to enforce texting law" - WISH-TV
(10 June 2012)
Fellow Hoosiers,
The Indiana legislature has delivered a bill, HB 1129, to Governor Daniels' desk that would attempt to prohibit drivers from texting while driving. We must not let this ill bill become lousy law! Below is a copy of the letter I submitted to the governor using the form on his website, here: http://www.in.gov/gov/2631.htm
If you're wondering why we all need to oppose laws of this nature, read my letter! Also, you might refer to my post from the last legislative session wherein I answer that question, here: http://bit.ly/doGvRc
02 May 2011
Governor Daniels,
This letter is a plea for an ear to hear regarding HB 1129, the Driver Texting Ban.
In May 2009, you delivered the commencement address at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. As I sat in my cap and gown, anxious to receive a paper validating my years of hard work, dreaming of the days to come in the new, "real" world I'd soon enter, your words gave me pause and have, in fact, never left me. I'm sure you have your address notes around somewhere for all the specifics, but the point you drove home was that our cities, counties, State, and nation are in dire need of more technical people speaking up about the issues we face. And so I am compelled to weigh in upon the matter of the Driver Txt Ban recently delivered to your desk: you absolutely must prevent HB1129 from becoming State Law!
There are several reasons to fight such legislation, but I only want to cover three of the best ones: enforceability, effectiveness, and accountability.
This law cannot be enforced without gross violation of personal rights. Since there are numerous - and legal - reasons to be interacting with a modern phone while driving, it is impossible for a law enforcement officer to develop any probable cause on a driver using a phone. A driver could just as easily be looking up a restaurant nearby, reviewing a shopping list, choosing a song or audio book, obtaining directions, et al., ad nauseum, and an observing officer would be absolutely unable to know if the driver is in violation of the law unless he first violates the driver's 4th amendment protection from illegal searches and seizures without a warrant or probable cause, or he convinces the driver to waive his 5th amendment protection from saying something stupid. If passed, this law WILL contribute to the widespread violation of our enumerated rights, and, to add insult to injury, each violated driver will have to pay hundreds of dollars afterwards! Forgive the crude analogy, but this concept is akin to being being forced to pay your rapist for his "service."
Laws of this type have not proven effective elsewhere. Arizona Democratic State Rep. Steve Farley, who was the first legislator in the country to introduce a bill that would ban texting while driving, has noted that "hands-free" legislation has not proven successful [1]. The California DMV also notes that keeping phones out of a driver's hand doesn't make the road safer [2]. More frustratingly, our own "Criminal Justice Institute Traffic Safety Division Director Ryan Klitzsch says it’s as much an informational campaign as an effort to crack down on distracted drivers" [3]. Passing a bill which would, if law, violate the rights of every citizen out of compliance therewith is the worst possible way to embark upon a public education campaign.
It is not for the People of Indiana to decide which distractions a driver can handle and which he cannot. In a free State, a driver is able to determine for himself what his own limitations are. No law can be appropriately tough on some and loose on others; at least, no law that focuses on the minutiae over the true issue can. A ban on texting utterly ignores the danger of drivers doing any of the other millions of things modern phones can do! To truly make the roads safer, the use of the phone altogether must be banned. But we cannot stop there, either: how could a driver focus on the road if his passenger is talking? Or if he is listening to music? God forbid the driver be a parent with misbehaving children in the car! Or reading an actual book! No, each driver must take the personal responsibility to make such decisions on his own, and he must be held accountable for those decisions. But this bill does not achieve this goal in an American way.
Governor, I won't even start to get into the discussions about the "nanny state." I'm sure you have heard them all before. Furthermore, given your success in your current office, I know you understand and embrace responsibility at a governmental and a personal scope. I implore you to send this abusive, misguided albeit well-intentioned, and un-American bill back to the drawing board. Similar bills have been defeated before in our Legislature; we can't allow this one to make it into law this time either.
Links for sources
[1] http://bit.ly/aVKlv8
[2] http://bit.ly/lTkm5u
[3] http://bit.ly/lsI2mw
Additional reading: in the last legislative session, I penned the following article fighting the idea of a driver texting ban and even presented a much more viable and less intrusive approach to improving road safety and decreasing the leading cause of accidents--driver distractions.
http://bit.ly/doGvRc
