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MOTHERS AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING
Years of Saving Lives
B y L au r i e D av i e s ,
Freelance Journalist
DRIVEN / fall 2005
2 5 Y E A R S O F S AV I N G L I V E S n 1 9 8 0 - 2 0 0 5
T
wenty-five years ago, a heartbroken mother made a pledge in her
deceased daughter’s bedroom. She would do something about the
outrage of drunk driving—a decision that quickly inspired a hand-
ful of grieving, determined mothers to join in the fight. n Though united
in cause, they had no office, no money and no clout. In fact, all they had
was sorrow, pluck and a picture of a pretty, 13-year-old girl killed by a
drunk driver. Yet they initiated one of the great grassroots successes in
American history. n They were as their name suggests: MADD. As their
fledgling organization grew, they stood toe to toe with politicians who knew
the stats but did not act. They took on a powerful industry that put profit
over safety. They challenged a society that viewed drinking and driving as
acceptable—even laughable. n And they caused a visceral reaction. n The
getting there wasn’t easy. It was tough. It was messy. And it was fraught
with obstacles. Yet MADD proved, time and time again, that it would not
be bullied or derailed. n In fact, MADD blazed a trail that other organizations have since followed. They made hard, cold statistics come to life.
They did not just say that drunk driving killed thousands and injured
­millions. They held up photographs—and described every nuance of their
loved ones’ lives—to prove it. n As a result, a mountain of traffic safety
and victims’ rights legislation has been passed. Annual alcohol-related traffic fatalities have dropped from an estimated 30,000 in 1980 to fewer than
17,000 today. And, perhaps most important, society no longer views drunk
driving as acceptable. n Looking back over 25 years, it’s an amazing story. A
grieving mother’s determination sparked a volunteer movement that swept
the nation and has saved hundreds of thousands of lives.
H ere is the story of ho w .
fall 2005 / DRIVEN
MOTHERS AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING
2 5 Y E A R S O F S AV I N G L I V E S n 1 9 8 0 - 2 0 0 5
(Left) Candy Lightner, Rep. Robert Matsui (D-CA), Cindy and
Laura Lamb, Sen. Claiborne Pell (D-RI) and Rep. Michael
Barnes (D-MD) at MADD’s first press conference held Oct.
1, 1980. (Top) First Lady Nancy Reagan at a 1987 National
Commission Against Drunk Driving event. (Right) MADD
activists from the early years.
The Early Days
Sue LeBrun-Green remembers the
May 1980 day well. Authorities called
her real estate office searching for her
friend and colleague Candy Lightner.
The news was tragic. A hit-and-run
driver had struck Candy’s 13-year-old
daughter Cari while she was walking
to a church carnival.
Knocked out of her shoes, Cari
landed 125 feet away. She died never
knowing what hit her. The hit-and-run
driver was turned in by his wife, who
was suspicious at his efforts to hide
their badly damaged car.
“A couple of days later Candy
called and said, ‘Sue, we just found out
the driver was drunk. Take me over to
the DMV. I want to pull his records.’”
There, the friends hit a brick wall.
“We were told we couldn’t just
walk in and pull someone’s driving
record. Candy said, ‘This man killed
my daughter.’ And they said, ‘It’s not
the DMV’s fault.’ They told us we
should be talking to judges. Judges’
offices referred us to state agencies.
Little by little, people were sending us
all over the place. We were actually
laying the foundation for MADD,”
LeBrun-Green says.
The duo quickly learned what
traffic-safety advocates already
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DRIVEN / fall 2005
knew. Drunk driving was not on
society’s radar.
“Before the 1980s, drinking and
driving was how people got home. It
was normal behavior,” says MADD
chief executive officer and longtime
traffic safety advocate Chuck Hurley.
Yet tens of thousands were dying
and no one but law enforcement and
a smattering of researchers and
­government agencies seemed to care.
“I was working hard on this issue,
just like a lot of us bureaucrats,” says
Marilyn Sabin, who was then alcohol
coordinator for the California Office
of Traffic Safety. Yet she watched DUI
bill after DUI bill fail in her state.
The feds met a similar fate.
“Congress had put $35 million
into Alcohol Safety Action Programs
around the country, but nothing was
happening. Judges were treating it
with a wink and a nod,” says Jim Fell,
MADD national board member who
then worked for the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
“Alcohol was involved in nearly 60
percent of fatal crashes and we were
banging our heads against the wall.
Then, all of a sudden, a woman named
Candy Lightner came along, kicking
and screaming about her daughter
who had been killed.”
A Seismic Shift
MADD set up an office—in Cari
Lightner’s still-decorated bedroom—
and got to work. LeBrun-Green says
the early days were hectic. “We gathered information, found other victims
through classified ads, mailed newsletters and tried to answer one question for ourselves and other victims:
‘How do I not get the runaround from
the system?’”
Sabin remembers the first time
she heard from the pair. “Candy and
Sue came in to find out about the politics and laws in California. As soon
as I met them and saw their passion,
I knew MADD was a keeper.”
In fact, the organization exploded.
Victims called faster than they
could keep up. Speaking engagements
and media requests flooded in. And,
politicians returned calls.
By September, MADD, or Mothers
Against Drunk Drivers as it was
originally called, was incorporated.
Donations started trickling in—often
in $5 and $10 amounts from victims
and concerned citizens. The organization was banging loudly on Gov. Jerry
Brown’s door to create a drunk
­driving task force. And West Coast
met East Coast when Cindy Lamb,
whose 5-month-old daughter,
Laura, became the nation’s youngest
paraplegic as the result of a drunk
driving crash, started a Maryland
chapter of MADD.
Then, on Oct. 1, 1980, Lightner
and Lamb riveted the nation during a
national press conference on Capitol
Hill. It was a seismic shift that catapulted the heartbroken moms into a
debate-driving, law-changing force
to be reckoned with.
“You could literally feel things
change at that moment,” says Hurley,
who was then working for the
National Safety Council. “On that
day, public tolerance of drunk
­driving changed forever.”
Starting a Wildfire
The mothers had struck a chord.
Victims of drunk driving and volunteers who simply cared deeply about
the cause began to join forces.
“We were in every newspaper
and on every television station
in the country. Housewives were
all of a sudden banding together
with the idea to change legislation,”
LeBrun-Green says.
Micky Sadoff was one of those
housewives. In 1982, recovering from
a head-on alcohol-related crash that
injured her and severely injured her
husband, Sadoff read a Time magazine article about MADD. It spurred
her to start a Milwaukee chapter.
“Eighty people showed up at the
first meeting,” says Sadoff, who later
served as MADD’s national president
from 1989 to 1991. “I sat there and
said, ‘What do I do now with all these
people who want to volunteer?’ So, we
started to go to court with families to
monitor drunk driving cases.”
The same story unfolded nationwide. “MADD was sprouting up in
communities all over the country. It
wasn’t top-down growth. It was a
bunch of small fires that started a
wildfire,” she says.
Fuel for that fire came from the
same source then as it does today.
Impassioned volunteers helped each
other mourn. They helped each other
navigate the criminal justice system.
And they worked tirelessly to spare
others the pain many of them had
endured. MADD’s lifesaving mission
often became a lifelong devotion.
“It’s pretty humbling to see the
long hours that are dedicated to
MADD,” says Kyle Ward, MADD’s
deputy executive director/director of
field operations. “I’ve been at MADD
for 16 years and I am still in awe of
how much our volunteers give—often
for complete strangers.”
MADD volunteers also distinguished themselves with the very
public way they took their emotion
and passion into courtrooms and in
front of cameras.
“Never before had people expressed
their grief in public—this was before
Oprah and Dr. Phil. It was groundbreaking what MADD did,” Sabin
says. “They did not stop putting a
face to the statistics. As a result, in
California I watched DUI legislation
sail through committees—committees
that had voted the same legislation
down before MADD had come along.”
NHTSA also realized MADD was
becoming a major player.
“We saw that MADD was really
getting the public’s attention,” Fell
says. “With our research bolstering
their cause, we realized they had the
emotional appeal we were lacking.”
Mounting Success
“All of a sudden, legislators realized
they were standing in front of a tidal
wave,” says Dean Wilkerson, who
served as MADD’s executive director
from 1993 to 2004. “They started
­passing laws right and left.”
By 1982, new anti-drunk driving
laws had been introduced in 35 states
and passed in 24. By 1983, 129 new
anti-drunk driving laws had passed.
With the organization’s growth
and increasing efforts came the
need for more funds. The first signi­
ficant financial supporter of MADD
was an officer of Preferred Risk
Insurance Company named Bob
Plunk, whose in-laws had been killed
by a drunk driver. Preferred Risk
later became GuideOne Insurance,
which made large donations to
MADD in the late 1990s.
In 1981, funding increased sub­
stantially when the Leavey Foundation
gave MADD $100,000. Mr. Leavey,
one of the founders of Farmers
Insurance, had had a daughter killed
by a drunk driver. The Leavey
Foundation would ultimately give
MADD $1.3 million in its early years.
Also in 1981, NHTSA awarded
MADD a $60,000 grant to help start
new chapters.
Meanwhile, MADD’s numbers,
l­egislative successes and
funding sources grew.
By the end of
1980, there were 11
MADD chapters in
California, with six
more being formed.
By 1982, MADD
was 100 chapters strong
and President Ronald
Reagan announced the
Presidential Commission
on Drunk Driving and
invited MADD to parti­
cipate. Also that year,
Congress passed a federal
Then-Secretary of Transportation Elizabeth Dole, Candy
bill awarding highway
Lightner, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and other dignitaries
funds to states with antilook on as President Ronald Reagan signs the Uniform
drunk driving efforts.
Drinking Age Act into law on July 17, 1984.
fall 2005 / DRIVEN
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MOTHERS AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING
Law enforcement officers at the 1990 MADD
candlelight vigil
First Big Battle
In 1983, MADD relocated its
national headquarters to Texas in the
Dallas-Fort Worth area. Meanwhile, the
Presidential Commission on Drunk
Driving released its recommendations—chief among them a proposal to
deny highway funds to states that did
not raise the drinking age to 21.
This set up MADD’s first big battle.
With Ronald Reagan, a states’ rights
president, in the White House, the
recommendation essentially pitted
traffic-safety proponents and spirited
moms against a popular president
and the cash-loaded alcohol and hospitality industries. MADD, backed
by research showing more alcoholrelated teen car crashes occurred
in states with legal drinking ages
under 21, pushed for the legislation.
“From the media’s point of view,
it was the perfect underdog story.
You had a grassroots person from
California with no previous
Washington experience taking the
town by storm,” Hurley recalls.
One Washington insider happened
to think the Reagan administration
should support the law.
“I thought it was very important
that the administration be in favor
of the law,” says Sen. Elizabeth Dole
(R-NC), who served as Transportation
Secretary under President Reagan.
And she looks back proudly on the
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DRIVEN / fall 2005
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MADD National President Norma Philips and
supporters at the Dec. 9, 1985, finale of the
March Across America for MADD event.
watershed moment when the president
changed his mind.
During an Oval Office meeting on
the issue, Reagan cut through the
clutter—namely reminders from his
top advisors that he should stick to
his states’ rights stance—and simply
asked Secretary Dole a question.
“Well, wait a minute,” he said,
“doesn’t this help save kids’ lives?”
“I said, ‘Yes, Mr. President, it
does,’” Dole recalls.
“Well then, I support it,” he said.
And the next day, Dole announced
President Reagan’s support for
the measure during a MADD press
conference on the Capitol steps.
The legislation had already
passed the House. But White House
support may have been the difference-maker in the Senate, where
freshman Sen. Frank Lautenberg
(D-NJ) was leading this effort on
the pending highway bill.
“I was practically told not to
come to one fairly well-known
New Brunswick (N.J.) restaurant
by the owner because of my
[support of the] 21-drinking age
bill,” says Lautenberg, noting
that his home state’s legal drinking
age at that time was 18. “And my
two younger kids didn’t even want
to talk to me. They were in their
late teens and said I was killing all
their fun.”
MADD National President Katherine
Prescott speaks out about the need
for a Victims’ Rights Amendment to
the Constitution.
Ultimately, President Reagan
signed the Uniform Drinking Age Act
into law on July 17, 1984.
In fact, Reagan even did a bit of
an unplanned commercial spot that
day. “My memory is that Candy stuck
a MADD button on the president
after he signed the bill,” Hurley
says. Reagan smiled, photographers
loved it and the shot turned up in
newspapers nationwide.
Growing Up
If the early 1980s were a period
of emotion and explosion, the rest of
the decade was a time for MADD to
dig in and establish its footing.
By the end of 1984, MADD had
330 chapters in 47 states. This
extraordinary growth—held together
by the passion and determination of
volunteers—had galvanized MADD
into a powerful force.
Yet, with the growth came
growing pains.
Amid differences, Lightner left the
organization in 1985. And a group of
corporate-savvy board members got to
work to make MADD more solvent
financially. Rob Beck was one of them.
“The rapid growth and demands of
the organization outgrew the capacity
of the initial management to keep up.
So we sat down and figured out what
we needed to do financially to save
the organization,” he says.
“They were knights in shining
armor really,” says Janice Lord, who
came on board as the national director
of victim services in 1983. “They loved
MADD’s mission. With their corporate
knowledge, they also understood budgets and non-profit requirements. They
met all night sometimes trying to fix
financial issues.”
During this time, Lord also got
to work developing the structure for
MADD’s less-publicized but more
implicit goal: serving victims.
“I went to MADD with the
assumption that there was professional literature about the victim
aspect of crashes. There was nothing,” Lord says. She interviewed
hundreds of DUI victims and ultimately laid the groundwork for what
today has become a model for how
to serve victims.
“When people hear MADD, they
think of political gains. But we have
always been about trying to help
­victims be healthy again,” Lord says.
Laughter and Tears
Meanwhile, the mothers were
still in the spotlight. By 1985, Sadoff
was a national vice president traveling the country to speak about
MADD’s objectives. She and other
spokeswomen often paused to laugh
about being normal-moms-turnedmedia-magnets.
On one occasion, one of them did a
television interview—unbelievably—
just minutes after having a baby.
“She had not made it to the hospital
and had literally just given birth to
her fifth child at home,” Sadoff says.
Yet, with her older children misbehaving in the background and her
infant baby swaddled in her arms,
the cameras rolled.
“Talk about grassroots—we were
it,” Sadoff says, adding that, before
MADD, none of them had done public speaking. “For my first speech,
I wrote the statistics on my hand.
Luckily I wasn’t perspiring.”
The levity and the deep bond
that volunteers shared was a side
(Top) MADD supporters plant a tree for those killed and injured
in the Kentucky Bus Crash. (Middle) MADD activists on the
steps of the U.S. Capitol for MADD’s 10th anniversary.
(Bottom) MADD National President Micky Sadoff with
President Bush, Sr.
of MADD that the public did not
always see.
“Legislative efforts were always
in the spotlight and we had a repu­
tation as a bunch of angry moms,”
Sadoff says. “My flip response to
that is: ‘Wouldn’t you be angry?’
But the truth is that MADD from
the very start has been men and
women, young and old, victims
and non-victims who care about
each other and know they can
make a difference.”
Their camaraderie also provided a
needed balance to those times when
the tragedy of drunk driving drove
them to their knees. May 14, 1988,
was one of those days.
On that fateful day in Kentucky, a
drunk driver slammed head-on into
a bus returning home from a church
outing. The bus burst into flames,
and 24 young people and three adults
perished in the inferno. Thirty more
were injured. The Kentucky Bus
Crash was the worst alcohol-related
crash in U.S. history.
MADD immediately dispatched a
crisis team to Kentucky.
“MADD was the only one out
there that understood the grief these
people were experiencing. We knew
that their grief was compounded by
the fact that someone had made the
choice to get behind the wheel of a
car after drinking, and that their loved
ones had died because a crime had
been committed,” says Millie Webb,
MADD national president from 2000
to 2002, who herself was badly
burned in a 1971 alcohol-related
crash that killed her 4-year-old
daughter and 19-month-old nephew.
In that 1971 crash, Webb had been
burned on nearly 73 percent
of her body, leaving scars
that comforted one young
victim. The tender picture
of Webb holding a little girl
who survived the Kentucky
bus crash pierces to the heart
and soul of who MADD is.
fall 2005 / DRIVEN
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MOTHERS AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING
“She would rub my burn scars and
talk and talk about how terrible it
was to watch her friends burn alive.
She felt at ease with my arms around
her,” Webb says. “There is beauty in
that. Scars are ugly. But she saw me
living with them and knew that she
would too.”
Early 1990s
By the time 1990 arrived, MADD’s
lifesaving message was paying off:
Alcohol-related traffic fatalities had
dropped to about 22,400. While still
unacceptable, the total had dropped by
nearly 8,000 since MADD’s inception
a decade earlier.
MADD also was holding victim
assistance training workshops across
the country and working hard for
­better victims’ rights.
Pursuing an objective that began in
1984, MADD continued to push for a
federal .08 blood alcohol concentration
(BAC) standard. Four states lowered
their illegal BAC laws from .10 to .08
by the end of 1990.
Always underscoring this and other
MADD efforts was a singular purpose.
“We didn’t fight to bring our children
back. We fought so other people
wouldn’t hurt,” Webb says. So the
battle to make America’s
roads safer continued.
In 1991, MADD
issued its first
(Left) MADD National President Katherine Prescott
at the 1996 Rating the States press event. (Right)
Youth activists at the 2000 MADD National Youth
Summit to Prevent Underage Drinking.
14
DRIVEN / fall 2005
Rating the States report, which rated
state and national anti-drunk driving
efforts and garnered significant
media attention. Wildly popular and
widely read, subsequent Rating the
States reports would follow in 1993,
1996, 1999 and 2002.
By 1992, a Gallup survey revealed
that Americans cited drunk driving as
the No. 1 problem on the nation’s
highways. And there was progress:
The release of the 1993 Fatal Accident
Reporting System statistics showed
that alcohol-related traffic fatalities
had dropped to a 30-year low.
“By the 1990s, MADD had
become well-balanced,” Hurley
says, adding that emotion, stronger
financial footing and an internal
­doctrine to support only policies
backed by science propelled MADD
to continued success.
While MADD’s national clout was
now firmly established, it was local
and state volunteers who gave the
organization a true national voice—
one battle and one region at a time.
Bob Shearouse, former national
director of public policy, remembers
the eye-opening moment when he
began volunteering at the local level.
“When I started, we didn’t have an
open container law in Georgia. You
could ride down the road with a
drink in one hand and the steering
wheel in another. I thought I would
go to the legislature, point
that out and they’d say,
‘You’re kidding,’ and pass
a law. It didn’t happen
that way.”
It took time, manpower
and tireless dedication.
But state by state, key antidrunk driving legislation
and victims’ rights bills were
­getting through.
“The role of victims and
volunteers cannot be understated in
the arena of public policy,” Shearouse
says. “They are the ones who had the
commitment and passion to drive this
2 5 Y E A R S O F S AV I N G L I V E S n 1 9 8 0 - 2 0 0 5
movement. They got the laws that are
saving lives today.”
Sometimes they got creative.
“I remember when MADD Florida
was having a particularly hard time
with legislation,” he says. “In the
Capitol rotunda they placed a pair of
shoes worn by each drunk driving
­victim killed in Florida the year
before. There were 1,100 pairs of
baby shoes, toddler shoes, men’s
shoes and women’s shoes.”
Undoubtedly, more than a few
­legislators swallowed hard on their
way to their Capitol offices that day.
Diversifying Funds
Also in the 1990s, former Executive
Director Dean Wilkerson and others
engineered a pivotal shift during
which MADD diversified its public
fundraising to include direct mail,
licensing agreements, sponsorships
and other avenues.
During this period, many cor­
porations allied with MADD both
financially and ideologically through
support of MADD’s programs. Auto­
makers such as General Motors,
DaimlerChrysler and Volkswagen
jumped on board as well as insurance
companies including Allstate, Nation­
wide, State Farm and—one of MADD’s
earliest partners—GuideOne.
Stonehenge, Ltd., developed a popular anti-drunk driving neckwear line.
Citibank kicked in a substantial contribution. Dial America dialed in to the
cause—and has contributed a whopping $25 million from magazine sales to
MADD in the past decade.
From Budget, Avis and Alamo to
General Mills and Coca-Cola, MADD
began popping up in product sponsorships everywhere. By 1994, The
Chronicle of Philanthropy released a survey showing that MADD was the most
popular charity in America.
Yet, holding up a mirror to the grassroots success that MADD has always
been, most of MADD’s financial support still came in individual donations.
“The reality is, even though
we’ve gotten great corporate
support, the heart and soul of
MADD has been the American
public. Individual donations
comprise nearly half of MADD’s
total revenues,” says Bobby
Heard, former national director
of programs and development.
Youth movement
Coinciding with this time in
MADD’s history was a growing focus
to protect youth from the dangers of
drinking. In 1995, at the request of
then-National President Beckie
Brown, MADD convened a
Commission on Youth—a move that
set the course for MADD’s future
efforts to prevent underage drinking.
“It was at that time that we made
the strategic decision to partner with
youth to combat the No. 1 youth drug
problem, which is underage drinking,”
Heard says. “By working closely with
them, we could help them see that
they could be a part of the solution.”
MADD kicked off a flurry of successful youth-oriented programs—
including MADD’s multimedia
school assembly shows, Youth In
Action and Summer Power Camps.
On the national stage, in 1995 the
Zero Tolerance for Youth Act was
adopted by Congress, inducing states
to make it illegal for those under 21
to drive with alcohol in their system.
And in 1997, MADD held its first of
two national Youth Summits to Prevent
Underage Drinking, which assembled
young people from every U.S. congressional district in Washington,
D.C., to brainstorm solutions to the
underage drinking problem. The
summit concluded with each parti­
cipant meeting with his or her
­representative or senator.
In fact, as a result of meeting a
youth delegate from West Virginia,
Sen. Robert Byrd appropriated $25 mil­
lion to combat underage drinking.
“I am convinced that because of one
teenager’s persuasiveness, Sen. Byrd
continues to champion that federal
funding today,”
Shearouse says.
In 1998, MADD elected its first
youth representative to its national
board of directors, and, in 1999, the
organization changed its mission
statement to reflect its youth emphasis. In addition to stopping drunk
driving and serving victims, a goal to
prevent underage drinking was added.
This mission is bolstered by
research showing the devastating
effects of underage alcohol use.
“Nearly 29 percent of all high
school students nationally begin
to drink before the age of 13,” says
Ralph Hingson, director of the
National Institute on Alcohol
Abuse and Alcoholism’s Division
of Epidemiology and Prevention
Research. “Those who do are
10 times more likely to become
­frequent binge drinkers.”
Additionally, studies show that
alcohol-dependent kids have less
frontal-lobe brain activity than their
non-alcohol-dependent counterparts.
Today, MADD offers a continuum
of youth programs aimed at reducing
underage drinking.
The push for .08
Meanwhile, by the late 1990s, the
drive to establish .08 percent as the
illegal BAC in every state was still in
high gear.
Laser-focused on “.08” for years,
MADD continued to make known
(Left) Youth in Action teens speak to the media
about underage drinking prevention at a 1996
event. (Middle) A MADD activist signs his support of a national .08 BAC law. (Right) MADD
National President Karolyn Nunnallee at the
Dec. 29, 1999, event unveiling MADD’s HigherRisk Driver program.
the evidence showing that higher
BAC levels increased fatal crash
risk. Some states quickly moved
to lower their BAC levels to .08.
And volunteers who worked indefatigably to promote the lifesaving
legislation began to see success.
Many states, however, did
not budge.
One key piece of research was a
1996 study published by Hingson in
the American Journal of Public Health
estimating that a nationwide adoption of .08 percent BAC would result
in at least 500 fewer alcohol-related
deaths annually.
A side story regarding this
research once again illustrates
what MADD has done so well
throughout its 25-year history: It
puts a face to the statistics. In this
case, Hingson asked then-President
Millie Webb if he could dedicate
that journal article to her 4-year-old
daughter, Lori, who had died at the
hands of a .08 driver.
Although 75 percent of her little
body was critically burned, Lori
had survived in full, excruciating
fall 2005 / DRIVEN
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MOTHERS AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING
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A new millennium
The Patterson family of Huntingtown, Md., First Lady Hillary Clinton,
and MADD National Presidents Karolyn Nunnallee and Millie Webb at
the White House for the 1999 Tie One On For Safety campaign.
consciousness for two weeks. “She
was alert—so alert that she asked
for her allowance,” Webb says. Lori
died before she got to spend her $3
allowance. And for 20 years, Webb
carried those three bills with her.
At a board meeting following the
publication of Hingson’s study,
Webb presented Hingson with one
of the dollars.
“I was left speechless. I was completely…I don’t know how quite to
express it,” Hingson says, his voice
still breaking at the memory. “It was
stunning to receive such a deeply
personal gift from her.”
Closing in
While such tender stories did not
make headlines, they were always at
the heart of the 16-year fight.
By 1998, 17 states had adopted
the .08 percent BAC—and a growing
number of studies showed that the
measure was saving lives. Despite
substantial opposition from the alcohol industry, hotel and restaurant
associations, and even from some citizens opposed to MADD’s objectives,
MADD worked for legislation that
would withhold federal highway
funds from states that did not adopt
the .08 percent law.
Sen. Lautenberg was again at
the forefront.
“Once we got the 21 drinking age
bill through and we estimated we
16
DRIVEN / fall 2005
Activists on Capitol Hill during MADD’s 20th anniversary in 2000.
had saved about 20,000 young people
from dying on the highways, that was
something everyone cheered. But it
didn’t make passing .08 an easier
task,” says Sen. Lautenberg, who
wrote the Senate’s .08 provision.
In fact, opponents skillfully used
scare tactics and misinformation.
“From talk shows to the news
media, the opposition had everyone
believing this would usher in prohibition. They said if MADD got .08,
we’d be back the next year for .04,
which, of course, was not true,”
Shearouse says.
Meanwhile, he watched while
House committee members escorted
alcohol industry representatives into
committee meetings while victims
sat outside because there “wasn’t
room for them.”
Finally, in 1998, the .08 measure
passed in the Senate but failed in the
House, setting up the last big push.
“I was doing a talk show in Ohio
and a liquor lobbyist called in and
attacked me—I mean really attacked
me,” Webb says. “He said we wouldn’t
be satisfied until couples couldn’t
even have one drink over dinner
together. He called me a prohibitionist. I told him, ‘I’ve been burned alive
because of a .08 driver. I buried my
4-year-old. I have scientific evidence
behind me. What have you got?’”
Ultimately, Congress sent legislation to the White House mandating
states pass .08 BAC laws or else lose
highway funding.
For Webb, the legislation brought
29 years of frustration, grief and activism full circle. “Finally, after all the
studies and us sticking to our guns at
the local, state and national level, the
whole world knew that .08 was a level
where no one should be on the roadway. I felt that my daughter had not
died in vain,” she says.
In fact, when Webb stood in the
Oval Office on Oct. 23, 2000—the
day President Clinton signed the legislation into law—she flashed back to
the aftermath of her 1971 crash.
“For a minute I was back in that
ICU. I had just learned my child
was dead and I was burned so badly
I couldn’t even raise my hand to
wipe my tears. Then I looked around
the Oval Office. It was a miracle—
not just for me but for so many
other victims.”
Although she did not plan to tell
her story at the ensuing Rose Garden
reception, Webb privately told the
president what the law meant to her.
“President Clinton looked me in
the eye and said, ‘Millie, this is what
the world needs to hear.’ And he
walked out to the Rose Garden with
me, holding my hand.”
Bolstered by the president’s
words and her own commitment
to spare others her pain, she did
indeed tell her story that day.
By 2000, MADD’s efforts to educate the public were making a definite difference—a Gallup survey
revealed that 97 percent of the public
recognized MADD’s name. States had
passed thousands of laws, and by
2002, alcohol-related traffic deaths
were at 17,524.
However, this was a disturbing
increase from a 1999 low of 16,572.
Furthermore, about half a million
people were still being injured in
drunk driving crashes.
Consequently, in 2002, MADD
convened a National Impaired
Driving Summit, bringing trafficsafety experts together to strategize
the most effective measures to
reverse the rising trend in alcoholrelated traffic deaths and injuries.
The summit resulted in a sciencebased eight-point action plan
designed to reinvigorate the fight
against drunk driving.
“The fact that they are focused
on initiatives supported with rigorous scientific evidence enhances
their credibility with legislators
(Left) President Clinton and other dignitaries applaud MADD National President Millie
Webb at the Oct. 23, 2000, Rose Garden
reception that followed the signing of the
national .08 BAC legislation. (Right) MADD
National President Wendy Hamilton testifies before the U.S. House Subcommittee
on Education Reform on Feb. 11, 2004.
and ­government organizations,”
Hingson observes.
In fact, by 2003, MADD’s credibility in Washington, D.C., was evident as MADD National President
Wendy Hamilton was asked several
times to testify before Congressional
leaders on the reauthorization of the
Transportation Equity Act for the
21st Century (TEA-21), a six-year
highway funding bill.
Meanwhile, MADD has steadily
built upon its legacy of strong victim
services—today training victim advocates with a more formalized curriculum and working to make it easier
for victims to get the help they need.
Looking back, looking ahead
It’s inspiring to trace MADD’s
remarkable journey 25 years down
the road.
With broken hearts and meager
beginnings, the early leaders of
MADD ignited a movement that
has helped save more than 300,000
lives in 25 years.
“MADD did it. They brought
their broken hearts to the public,”
Sen. Lautenberg says. “As hard as
I or any other legislator
might work,
it doesn’t get
any better
than MADD
because it is
so heartfelt.”
Sen. Dole
agrees. “They
are grassroots
heroes really.
They have helped
change the climate
of safety in America
and tens of thousands of lives have
been saved.”
Ordinary Americans no longer
grab “one for the road,” and
“designated driver” is a household
term. The organization, which now
boasts approximately 2 million
­ embers and supporters, has
m
changed laws and behavior. But
not content to bask in the glow
of its silver anniversary, MADD
knows that key battles still remain.
Loopholes in underage drinking
laws make it easy for youth to buy,
possess and drink alcohol. Law
enforcement agencies need more
resources to do their jobs effectively.
And, in perhaps the ultimate insult
to victims, some courtrooms still slap
offenders on the wrist.
So, in some ways the story con­
tinues where it began—with a relentless pursuit for better laws, better
enforcement and stiffer punishments.
But the story of MADD has always
been one of triumph over adversity.
They have pushed for laws no one
ever thought would pass. They have
dedicated years—in some cases entire
lives—to making America’s roads
safer despite the arguments of those
with other agendas. And they have
helped thousands upon thousands of
survivors survive.
The casual observer might say that
MADD had its day or that the drinking and driving problem has been
solved. Yet, as strong and determined
as ever, MADD knows the heartache
of those who can testify otherwise.
Drunk driving forces parents to bury
their children—and children to bury
their parents. It strips thriving families of their health and livelihood. It
crunches much more than metal—it
crushes dreams.
And it is 100 percent preventable.
So, as long as drunk drivers endanger lives, MADD will be there fighting for safer, sober roads. They will
work to win the hearts of adolescents
and young drivers, who hold the
keys to the future of traffic safety in
America. And they will take on those
with money, power and influence
who argue for special interests and
against public safety.
And they will win. One saved life
at a time…they will win.
fall 2005 / DRIVEN
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