Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions-S 1993

STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS

By Mr. WARNER (for himself and Mrs. CLINTON):

S. 1993. A bill to amend title 23, United States Code, to provide a highway safety improvement program that includes incentives ot States to enact primary safety belt laws; to the Committee on Environment and Public Works.

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Mr. DeWINE. Mr. President, let me first congratulate my colleague from Virginia, Senator Warner, for the very fine statement he just made a moment ago about the bill that he and Senator Clinton are introducing with regard to the primary seatbelt law. This is something I have been interested in for some time. I congratulate them for their very fine bill and Senator Warner's very fine statement. He is absolutely correct. If we are serious about saving lives on our highways in this country, there really is nothing more important that we can do than to get our fellow citizens to buckle up.

We have made great progress in this area, but the fact that many of our States do not have a primary seatbelt law on the books costs us thousands and thousands of lives each year. As my colleague from Virginia so eloquently stated in this Chamber a few minutes ago, all the experts-everyone who knows anything about highway safety-will tell you that the most important thing that we could do and the easiest thing we could do would be to have every State of the Union tomorrow, instantly, have a primary seatbelt safety law.

That simply means if law enforcement, instead of having to wait for another type of violation before they could cite someone for not wearing a seatbelt could cite someone directly for not using a seatbelt, the use of seatbelts would dramatically increase in this country. That is what has happened in every single State that has had these laws enacted. Seatbelt use dramatically goes up almost overnight.

We know there is an inverse relationship between the use of seatbelts and auto fatalities. Thousands and thousands of Americans' lives would be saved every single year. I wanted to come to the floor this afternoon after I listened to my colleague's speech in my office. I wanted to thank him. He has been a real leader in the area of highway safety and this is certainly one more example of his leadership.

When we take up the highway safety bill next year, there are a number of highway safety initiatives on which I have been working. I intend to bring them to the floor and talk about them and offer them as amendments, offer them as initiatives. Frankly, there is nothing as important as what my colleague from Virginia has suggested.

I hope the Senate will take this very seriously. This is a great opportunity we will have to save thousands and thousands of lives every year. So I salute my colleague from Virginia.