Not-A-Drop Law

Are there any drinkers, from future Presidents of the United States1 to future Presidents of the Ex-Convicts Jubilee Club, who before an incident of drunk driving, started out by thinking, "Hey, I think I'll go get blasted, then drive until I get a DUI, pass out at the wheel or kill somebody?" Just what I thought--none. 99% of drunk drivers start their journey into infamy the same way all drinkers do. First, while sober and as rational as they are going to be over the course of the evening, they decide that they could use a drink. Second, to get to their favorite watering hole, they hop into a car. On the way they reassure themselves that despite prior stupidity, they've read the little card that tells them how much they can drink before blow a .082 blood alcohol level and promise themselves, just to be safe, to cut the amount in half. "Yep, two beers and then straight home to mama."

Third, upon arriving they order their first drink and their IQs start dropping like prices at Wal-Mart. Next they're thinking, "Darn this tastes good, maybe I'll just drink enough to blow a .06." Then, with alcohol induced confidence they surmise, "Dad blam it! I can hold my liquor better than anyone, so I could probably have another drink and only blow a .075." This enhances their vision and, spying the manatee at the far end of the bar, they think, "Hey, look at the flippers on that one. This Bud's for you, baby." After drinking this toast, before long it's, "Shoot, time to go home."

Now possessed with the discernment of a wadded-up dish rag, they fish for the keys in their pockets and ask, "Boy, how do I feel?" To answer this question, they use the "can-I-find-the-door?" sobriety test. Finally, upon reaching the door thirty minutes later, with occasional drinks along the way to wet their dry throats, they step out into the night and conclude that they only have a blood alcohol level of .079999. Hence, so long as they leave the car window down so the cold air blows their eyelids open, they can safely drive. The rest is history as the refrain, "I only had two beers," is slurred out all across the country.

So, where along this continuum between sentient, future-presidential being to wadded-up dish rag would it be best to change the outcome? As an attorney who was once admonished by superiors in the military not to publish an essay that was critical of alcohol use among officers, who has defended drunk drivers, and who had associated with a brilliant attorney who over two years ago was rendered disabled by a repeat drunk driver, I am convinced that the only solution to this plague is to pass and culturally assimilate a not-a-drop law.3

Despite wishful tinkering with our criminal justice system, or longer jail sentences between drinks, so long as we as a society defer to the individual the choice of whether he or she is capable of drinking, the carnage will continue. Wake up America! You drinkers have shown that each and every one of you, at some point in your drinking careers, are incapable of retaining your asserted constitutional right to drink and then individually decide if it is safe to drive. As a group, I urge you to realize that we can no longer afford you this libertine luxury.

The only countries that have low drunk-driving fatalities are those countries that either shoot drunk drivers, or render it legally and socially unacceptable to drink any quantity of alcohol and then drive. Although Al Gore probably wishes we would have started shooting drunk drivers years ago, I do not yet advocate capital punishment for drunk drivers. (As yet, I only propose the death penalty for those that pee on the toilet seat.) Nevertheless, it's just plain dumb to have bartenders and drinkers decide if they're too drunk to drive, but it is imminently smart to require drinkers to be escorted to and from their watering holes--Rocky Anderson be damned!

1. Would Bush be president if he had killed someone when he got his DUI?
2. Considered to be drunk at this level in most states.
3 This does not refer to how much water should be left in the Colorado River before crossing over into Mexican territory, but it means I should be illegal to drink any alcohol before driving.

Loren M. Lambert
Feb. 2, 2001 ©