Feds Ban Texting While Driving by Bus Drivers, Truckers

Bans on texting while driving have cropped up in recent years around the country, and are now the law in 19 states and the District of Columbia. But the issue has largely been one left to the states, and not the federal government, becasue legislating the "rules of the road" is specificially a state responsibilty.

It appears Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood wants to change that. On Tuesday, LaHood declared a nationwide ban on texting while driving a bus or big rig. Offending commercial drivers will face a fine of $2,750.

On Tuesday, the federal government formally barred truckers and bus drivers from sending text messages while behind the wheel, putting its imprimatur on a prohibition embraced by many large trucking and transportation companies.

"We want the drivers of big rigs and buses and those who share the roads with them to be safe," said U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. "This is an important safety step, and we will be taking more to eliminate the threat of distracted driving."

LaHood has made the effort to curtail driver distractions a centerpiece of his tenure as the nation's top transportation official. Some saw his announcement as a step that might ultimately fuel a push to ban cellphone use by all drivers.

The Washington Post reports that LaHood says he has the power to impose this ban by bureaucratic rule because "existing rules on truckers and bus drivers give him the authority." A lawsuit or two might clarify that dubious declaration.

The only way the federal government has enforced its will on the road in the past has been to tie its policy preferences to highway construction and maintenance funds — such as it did for decades when Congress compelled states to agree to a national 55 mph speed limit. The national drinking age of 21 is also compelled because of a tie to highway funds And, indeed, that's how the bills on this issue working their way through Congress would work: Denying highway funds to any state that doesn't ban texting while driving within two years of it being signed by the president.

One wonders, then, how (or why) LaHood is imposing his will nationwide when Congress is poised to act.

(Read the whole story in The Washignton Post.)

James G. Lakely (jlakely@heartland.org) is co-director of the Center on the Digital Economy at The Heartland Institute and managing editor of InfoTech & Telecom News. Follow us on Twitter.