Commonwealth Times

Issue date: 11/12/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Rachel Larue [Click to enlarge]

About 75 students gathered Thursday in the University Student Commons to hear John M. McCardell Jr., president emeritus of Middlebury College, discuss U.S. alcohol regulations, which he said are "bad social policy and terrible law(s)."

McCardell presented information about Choose Responsibility, a nonprofit organization he founded this year. Choose Responsibility's main focus, he said, is to work toward legislation that will lower the legal drinking age from 21 to 18. Choose Responsibility thinks lowering the drinking age will bring social reform.

"Alcohol is a reality in the lives of young adults," McCardell said. "We can try to legislate it away, but it will still be a reality."

The laws McCardell hopes to change include Virginia's Alcohol Beverage Control Act, which prohibits anyone younger than 21 to consume, purchase or possess any alcohol beverage.

Students younger than 21 are further governed by Virginia's Zero Tolerance law, which targets underage drinking by punishing violators who bear any trace of alcohol with the loss of the violator's driver's license for a year, 50 hours of mandatory community service or fines up to $2,500.

McCardell said each state has the privilege to decide if it wants to uphold this legal drinking age.

According to the 1984 National Minimum Drinking Age Act, each state was required to raise the legal age for purchasing or possessing alcohol to 21. Each state had the right to set the drinking age differently, but a condition this law enacts is that 10 percent of its state highway funding will be withheld as a result.

"This is called incentive," McCardell said.

McCardell said statistics show safety belts and airbags save many more lives than the legal drinking age laws.

Safety belts and air bags saved about 18,000 lives in 2004, while the legal drinking age saved less than 2,000, according to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

McCardell said binge drinking is what causes deaths. According to McCardell, 18- to 21-year-olds' binge drinking increased more than 56 percent between 1993 and 2004. According to the Institutes of Medicine, 90 percent of all alcohol consumed by underage drinkers is consumed while binge drinking.

"Those fatalities … aren't happening out in the open," McCardell said.

In addition to lowering the drinking age to 18, McCardell proposed providing focused education classes that give an "alcohol license" to those ages 18 through 20 who have completed the classes. This license would give them the ability to purchase, possess and consume alcohol.

"We need to revisit alcohol education," McCardell said. "We are never going to eradicate underage drinking, but maybe we can provide some incentives to prevent it." Choose Responsibility states on its Web site that allowing 18- to 20-year-olds to choose when and how to consume alcohol, after proper training, teaches them responsible, lawful behavior and gives them appropriate responsibility for their age group. McCardell said that if any alcohol license holder would be found violating the laws, the license would be revoked.

McCardell said he hopes to have the 10 percent incentive removed. Choose Responsibility is lobbying Congress and aiming for a 2009 hearing of its proposed legislation.

"We see this as a serious issue," McCardell said. "People are beginning to pay attention to us and to the message we communicate." McCardell said he knows it's strange for a former college president, at his stage in life, to decide to "embark on a fool's errand" by founding Choose Responsibility.

"I find it very disappointing ... (that) you only looked at alcohol versus driving," one female attendee said. "There's significant data (you did not look at)."

She said McCardell failed to address well-founded scientific evidence about the harmful physical and psychological effects from alcohol consumption, especially for young adults.

Another attendee disagreed with McCardell, asking if his education plan was similar to giving birth control to children who will not practice abstinence.

"People are going to underage drink anyway, so we should educate them?" he asked rhetorically.

McCardell responded to disagreeing attendees by saying he knew not everyone would agree with his plan.

"You may or may not agree," he said. "We are not an advocate of drinking. We are advocates of choosing responsibility."

McCardell is writing a book he said will be published in the fall of 2008. He encouraged students to visit the Choose Responsibility Web site and get involved by commenting on its blog: http://chooseresponsibility.org.

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What you think? VCU students speak their mind

"I feel if a person is old enough to make crucial decisions like whether to go into the military and risk dying for our country, or choosing who the next president is going to be, then they should be able to make the choice of whether they want to drink or not. … If everything else is set at 18, why is drinking special?"

- LaVonna Martin, junior psychology major

"In the United States, with the age at 21, kids try to hide from their parents … and they'll go to a party and drink. … In some ways there could be a benefit (to lowering the age to 18). … But I don't think just dropping the age to 18 would help (solve all the issues)."

- Sam Corrie, senior mass communications major

What do you think? Let us know! Go to commonwealthtimes.com to write on our message boards or e-mail a letter to the editor at editor@commonwealthtimes.com.

Page 1 of 1

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Issue date: 11/12/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Rachel Larue [Click to enlarge]

About 75 students gathered Thursday in the University Student Commons to hear John M. McCardell Jr., president emeritus of Middlebury College, discuss U.S. alcohol regulations, which he said are "bad social policy and terrible law(s)."

McCardell presented information about Choose Responsibility, a nonprofit organization he founded this year. Choose Responsibility's main focus, he said, is to work toward legislation that will lower the legal drinking age from 21 to 18. Choose Responsibility thinks lowering the drinking age will bring social reform.

"Alcohol is a reality in the lives of young adults," McCardell said. "We can try to legislate it away, but it will still be a reality."

The laws McCardell hopes to change include Virginia's Alcohol Beverage Control Act, which prohibits anyone younger than 21 to consume, purchase or possess any alcohol beverage.

Students younger than 21 are further governed by Virginia's Zero Tolerance law, which targets underage drinking by punishing violators who bear any trace of alcohol with the loss of the violator's driver's license for a year, 50 hours of mandatory community service or fines up to $2,500.

McCardell said each state has the privilege to decide if it wants to uphold this legal drinking age.

According to the 1984 National Minimum Drinking Age Act, each state was required to raise the legal age for purchasing or possessing alcohol to 21. Each state had the right to set the drinking age differently, but a condition this law enacts is that 10 percent of its state highway funding will be withheld as a result.

"This is called incentive," McCardell said.

McCardell said statistics show safety belts and airbags save many more lives than the legal drinking age laws.

Safety belts and air bags saved about 18,000 lives in 2004, while the legal drinking age saved less than 2,000, according to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

McCardell said binge drinking is what causes deaths. According to McCardell, 18- to 21-year-olds' binge drinking increased more than 56 percent between 1993 and 2004. According to the Institutes of Medicine, 90 percent of all alcohol consumed by underage drinkers is consumed while binge drinking.

"Those fatalities … aren't happening out in the open," McCardell said.

In addition to lowering the drinking age to 18, McCardell proposed providing focused education classes that give an "alcohol license" to those ages 18 through 20 who have completed the classes. This license would give them the ability to purchase, possess and consume alcohol.

"We need to revisit alcohol education," McCardell said. "We are never going to eradicate underage drinking, but maybe we can provide some incentives to prevent it." Choose Responsibility states on its Web site that allowing 18- to 20-year-olds to choose when and how to consume alcohol, after proper training, teaches them responsible, lawful behavior and gives them appropriate responsibility for their age group. McCardell said that if any alcohol license holder would be found violating the laws, the license would be revoked.

McCardell said he hopes to have the 10 percent incentive removed. Choose Responsibility is lobbying Congress and aiming for a 2009 hearing of its proposed legislation.

"We see this as a serious issue," McCardell said. "People are beginning to pay attention to us and to the message we communicate." McCardell said he knows it's strange for a former college president, at his stage in life, to decide to "embark on a fool's errand" by founding Choose Responsibility.

"I find it very disappointing ... (that) you only looked at alcohol versus driving," one female attendee said. "There's significant data (you did not look at)."

She said McCardell failed to address well-founded scientific evidence about the harmful physical and psychological effects from alcohol consumption, especially for young adults.

Another attendee disagreed with McCardell, asking if his education plan was similar to giving birth control to children who will not practice abstinence.

"People are going to underage drink anyway, so we should educate them?" he asked rhetorically.

McCardell responded to disagreeing attendees by saying he knew not everyone would agree with his plan.

"You may or may not agree," he said. "We are not an advocate of drinking. We are advocates of choosing responsibility."

McCardell is writing a book he said will be published in the fall of 2008. He encouraged students to visit the Choose Responsibility Web site and get involved by commenting on its blog: http://chooseresponsibility.org.

--- ---

What you think? VCU students speak their mind

"I feel if a person is old enough to make crucial decisions like whether to go into the military and risk dying for our country, or choosing who the next president is going to be, then they should be able to make the choice of whether they want to drink or not. … If everything else is set at 18, why is drinking special?"

- LaVonna Martin, junior psychology major

"In the United States, with the age at 21, kids try to hide from their parents … and they'll go to a party and drink. … In some ways there could be a benefit (to lowering the age to 18). … But I don't think just dropping the age to 18 would help (solve all the issues)."

- Sam Corrie, senior mass communications major

What do you think? Let us know! Go to commonwealthtimes.com to write on our message boards or e-mail a letter to the editor at editor@commonwealthtimes.com.

Page 1 of 1

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