CITIZENS
for
Limited Taxation & Government
Post Office Box 408 Peabody, Massachusetts
01960 (617) 248-0022
E-Mail: cltg@cltg.org Web-page: http://cltg.org
CLT&G
Update
Saturday, November 14,
1998
Remember when, once upon a time, we thought we were
free and believed that government was answerable to We the People -- a time when we were
more than just the funding mechanism upon which it fed? It really wasn't all that very
long ago ...
I recall sitting at the witness table before a U.S.
Senate committee in Washington, DC, naively arguing against a federal mandatory seat belt
law and thinking we had a chance. It was 1989 and the justification then too for peeling
off "just a little bit" of our freedom was to lighten "the financial burden
on society."
First came our freedom, the unalienable rights with
which we are all born, I reminded the senators. With this freedom we formed a government,
primarily to safeguard our liberty. This government has grown and expanded over the years,
assumed new powers, created new programs -- programs it now contends are becoming too
expensive to support.
The solution might be to re-evaluate the expansive
programs and their costs, I pointed out to the senators, but it certainly is not to erode
the very liberty for which we formed a government to protect in the first instance.
It was a losing position then and apparently it still
is. Freedom has a price. What remains of it is still relatively cheap. But too many prefer
being taken care of and are willing to pay the price. And so we are steadily losing it and
the inertia is building.
Chip Ford --
NATIONAL MOTORISTS ASSOCIATION NEWS
VOLUME 9 - ISSUE 6
November/December 1998
NHTSA Denies All NMA Suggestions on Air Bag Rules
NMA's comments to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), claiming
that the agency's rule ignored the safety of many individuals, were denied. In fact,
almost all comments on the final rule were denied by NHTSA.
NHTSA appears to be using the threat of
an air bag killing a child, as an incentive for adults to place kids in the back seat.
While NMA agrees that kids are safest in the back seat (in most types of vehicles), we
believe it is utterly irresponsible for the federal government to justify the mandate for
these potentially lethal devices in this manner.
In its response, NHTSA insists that it
knows best about who should and shouldn't be allowed to have on/off switches installed.
The official response says "NHTSA fully considered allowing persons to deactivate
their air bags without having to show or claim actual risk. The agency decided that public
safety interests dictate that individuals who do not fall within one of the specified risk
groups should not be allowed to have an on-off switch installed. NHTSA does not believe
that an individual's belief that he or she has the right to choose whether to have an air
bag outweighs society's interest in avoiding death and serious injury and the enormous
public expense associated with unnecessary injury."
While we have long used the analogy that
the American public would not accept a federally mandated vaccine that kills a child or
small adult for every 20 or 30 lives saved, NHTSA puts a different spin on the ratio of
lives saved versus lost by air bags. NHTSA says, "The most recent data (June 1, 1998)
indicate that while 105 persons have been killed by air bags, 3,148 persons have been
saved. Therefore, a person is 31 times more likely to be saved by an air bag than killed
by an air bag."
It's almost as if NHTSA believes death
by air bag is just punishment for a child whose parents didn't buckle them up properly.
"The vast majority of 105 air bag deaths could have been prevented through simple
behavior modification, namely wearing a safety belt and moving the children to the back
seat."
NHTSA simply doesn't believe motorists
have the right to use their own judgement, so it has eliminated any chance for citizens to
make their own decisions regarding air bags. For example, the agency claims, "... any
deactivation , or switching off, of an air bag by of for an individual who does not fall
within the specified risk groups constitutes misuse. That individual is safer with an air
bag than without one. Accordingly, allowing all members of the general public to have
on-off switches installed, regardless of risk, can only increase the potential for
misuse."
CHRYSLER SETTLES AIR BAG DEATH
LAWSUIT
In one of the first lawsuits to come to
fruition, Chrysler Corp. agreed to an unknown but estimated multi-million-dollar
out-of-court settlement over the air bag death of a Tennessee child. The settlement
forestalled what would have been the first trial of a lawsuit over hazards posed by air
bags to children. The parents sought $10 million in compensatory damages from the
manufacturer of their Dodge Caravan. The minivan was struck by another vehicle and knocked
into a ditch. The passenger-side bag deployed, striking the child in the face. She died at
a hospital 18 hours later. NMA will continue to push for a change in federal law that
would make air bags optional equipment. Unfortunately, more children and small adults will
likely die from the mandated devices before that happens.
The National Motorists Association website
can be found at: http://www.motorists.org.
The Massachusetts state coordinator, Ivan Sever of Needham, can be contacted at ma@motorists.org or by calling (781) 449-7231
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17
U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who
have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and
educational purposes only. For more
information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
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