Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-09-17
DON'T SPEED UP
By Frederic j. Haskin
-X7 ASHINGTON, Sept. 12.-When you
w see a straight stretch of road in


are gong last enough ALREADY. every time
you decide to open the throttle and burn the
road for while, you are in a measure risk
ing your own life and the lives of other peo-
pie.
At least, that seems to be the opinion of
some expert observers of automobile traffic,
who are trying to solve the ever-growing &C
cident problem. For example, Harry D. Will
lar, assistant chief engineer of the Maryland
state roads commission, finds that most of
the accidents in that state occur on straight
stretches Of the best road, and not at inter-
sections or at curves. Pascing on such
stretches is a leading cause of accidents.
Sometimes the faulty driving or judgment of
the man who is trying to pass another car
is the cause, and about often it is due to
the failure of the man ahead to give right
of way.
Willar's observations directly contradict
the statement which has often been made that
most accidents surfaced roads are due to
skidding. They concur, however, with the
opinions of many other observers. The dan
ger increases in direct ratio the speed in
creases. Few accidents Of any moment oc-
cur in crowded traffic, because every one is
going slowly, and necessarily taking good
deal of care. Neither do many accidents oc-
cur on rough country roads, where it is hard
to make more than eighteen miles an hour.
But when one car is making thirty miles an
hour a long stretch of road, and another
one tries to pass it, necessitating a speed of
accident. The man ahead may not hear the
signal, may veer to the left after the other
car is alongside, forcing it into the ditch or
over an embankment. Then there is the car
coming from the other direction, perhaps
also at forty miles an hour 1t may be out
Of sight around a curve a mile ahead one
minute, and less than a minute later, it will
be directly in front of the two cars approach
ing from the opposite direction. There are
few roads that will safely accommodate all
three cars in a row.
A Neglected Subject
It is amazing how little this subject of au-
tomobile accidents has been studied. You
can find nothing but scattered and conflict
ing opinions on the subject. And yet the
problem is most serious one. Automobiles
kill more people in a year in New York state
than have been killed by Mexican bandits and
rebels in seven years, according to one au-
thority. In four years the number of deaths
in New York City annually due to auto acct
dents increased from 483 to 1918. All over
the country it is the same. Auto accidents
kill more people than railroad accidents and
more than robbers. Automobiles are the
greatest single cause of violent deaths in
America, and, worse than that, the number
of fatalities due to them grows steadily. We
are evidently approaching an intolerable con-
dition Yet no one seems to have found it
worth while to make a thorough analysis of
the causes Of accidents, so locating the chief
their control.
study of what information on the sub
ject can be found brings out strongly two
conclusions. In the first place, the funda-
mental cause of most accidents is speeding
the misuse of the enormous power which a
motor car puts in the drivers hands. In the
second place, the control of accidents is best
accomplished, not by traffic regulations, but
by imposing heavy penalties upon a man
when he actually causes damage by his care
lessness, and, above ALL by the revoklng OF
licenses for repeated offenses. In New York
City the same driver has been convicted OF
careless driving six times in a single year,
and is still driving. He is at least as much a
menace to the public safety as the average
gunman.
Education is here needed When the peo-
pie have been made to realize that careless
driving is crime, and to demand proper pun
ishment for it, then the courts will begin
melting out that punishment. A campaign
to educate the pedestrian will have to go
along with the other. Beyond doubt, pedes-
trians who dart across the street in the mid
die of the block and children who chase balls
across the street, present the autoist with a
problem which he successfully solve only
by luck.
Abuse of Power
F. B. House, presiding magistrate of the
New York traffic court, believes that the
problem of auto accidents is largely prob
lem in preventing the abuse of power by ap-
plying adequate punishment for such abuse.
1t is an axiom Of social observers that any
man who has power will tend to abuse 1t.
Every monarch, every father, every owner
of a dog, is more or less bully. He has
power over something else and he has an
irrepressible tendency to abuse it, the while
making excuses to himself for what he does
The man who has fifty-horse power under
his throttle is no exception. He cannot help
feeling that the pedestrians ought to nave
sense enough to keep out of the way.
The effort to restrain this man in his ex-
uberant moments by complicated regulations
is failure. For example, Washington has
several speed limits, according to the part
of the city one is in, and the number OF
houses to the block. But man does not go
along alternately studying his speedometer
and counting the houses in the block, espe-
cially at night.
Here the fallacy of so much American leg
islation is again illustrated. Here is the
theory seen in hundred prohibitory laws Of
one kind and another, that if you just enact
enough regulations about mans conduct,
you can save both his life and his soul.
What you actually accomplish is to make
his life burden with your endless restr1c-
tons and to cramp the development of what
ever he may have in the way of a soul. The
to give him all the freedom possible, make
laws as few and simple as possible, and when
the man actually does harm, punish him Sc
verely, or if he is irresponsible, confine him
in an institution. After all, civilization is
only possible on the theory that most Of us
are responsible beings who can be trusted.
If most of us are not that, then the nation
should be converted into one great asylum
with high fence around it.
I~r11 e. ,0f0 riYoC 10 inn re-