I was reading this morning that the Vermont legislature is trying to work out the differences in the highway safety bills that came out of the two chambers. It looks like they won’t resolve it this session, which is good news for anyone who does not want to see Vermont turn into a police state.
No, I’m not complaining about the banning of cell phones.
I’m referring to the primary enforcement seatbelt law that both chambers agree on. The legislature is selling our freedom for 3.7 million in federal highway dollars. Once this passes, the police can stop a person for not wearing a seatbelt.
My guess, based on the overwhelming support for this, is that most people already wear seatbelts. They figure that this law will not affect them.
They couldn’t be more wrong.
This law authorizes the police to pull over anyone they want to, as long as they claim that the person did not have on a seatbelt. I have no reason to believe that the police will abuse this power, but I have no reason to believe that they won’t either.
The important thing here is that once we give our rights away, we are not likely to get them back.
Here’s a question for those who are supporting this law: when you are in court fighting your ticket because you were wearing your seatbelt, who do you think the judge will believe, you or the officer?
This law grants power to the police that they should not have. Thankfully, since the legislature cannot agree on whether or not to ban hand-held cell phone use while driving, there is still time to stop this.
I can’t believe that cell phone use would bring about disagreement, but giving police a free pass to pull over anyone they want garners universal support.
Do I sound like I have anti-government paranoia? Maybe, but I’m not the only one.
Here’s a good post, from a non-local.
12:37 pm on May 3rd, 2007
You are fortunate to have that bill postponed. Over here in NH, HB802 - which was passed by a slim margin in the House and is now onto the Senate, would (if passed and signed by Gov. Lynch) put in effect a seatbelt law - which would be a primary offense - yup - police can pull you over for a seatbelt violation. Lovely. If it passes we’ll got from the only state still not to have a seatbelt law to this.
This legislative session has been horrific in the terms of personal liberties - smoking bans, seatbelt laws, no parental notification for a minor having an abortion, fines for releasing balloons into the air…
There are times when I wonder - when will the people say enough is enough. Do they even have that will anymore? This desire (is it that the right word?) to outsource personal desision-making and personal responsiblity scares the peejeebers out of me. My mind always goes to the nightmare scenario - what would my fellow citizens do if our government ever fell to a foreign invader? I shudder.
12:43 am on May 9th, 2007
This law authorizes the police to pull over anyone they want to, as long as they claim that the person did not have on a seatbelt.
You can extrapolate from this scenario what can happen under the Military Commissions Act which suspends habeas corpus for non-citizens. Kind of hard to prove you’re a citizen if you can be held indefinitely without a trial.
Seat belt law is bad. Cell phone law too. MCA terrible. Too many laws. Not enough common sense.