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Unit: $U62

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Cite as: 529 U. S. 861 (2000)

877

Opinion of the Court

requirements almost exclusively through the installation
of detachable automatic seatbelts. 46 Fed. Reg. 53419–
53420 (1981). This Court held the rescission unlawful.
State Farm, supra, at 34, 46. And the stage was set for
then-DOT Secretary, Elizabeth Dole, to amend FMVSS 208
once again, promulgating the version that is now before us.
49 Fed. Reg. 28962 (1984).

B

Read in light of this history, DOT’s own contemporaneous
explanation of FMVSS 208 makes clear that the 1984 version
of FMVSS 208 reﬂected the following signiﬁcant considera-
tions. First, buckled up seatbelts are a vital ingredient of
Id., at 29003; State Farm, supra, at 52
automobile safety.
(“We start with the accepted ground that if used, seatbelts
unquestionably would save many thousands of lives and
would prevent tens of thousands of crippling injuries”).
Second, despite the enormous and unnecessary risks that a
passenger runs by not buckling up manual lap and shoulder
belts, more than 80% of front seat passengers would leave
their manual seatbelts unbuckled. 49 Fed. Reg. 28983 (1984)
(estimating that only 12.5% of front seat passengers buckled
up manual belts). Third, airbags could make up for the dan-
gers caused by unbuckled manual belts, but they could not
Id., at 28986 (concluding that,
make up for them entirely.
although an airbag plus a lap and shoulder belt was the most
“effective” system, airbags alone were less effective than
buckled up manual lap and shoulder belts).

Fourth, passive restraint systems had their own disadvan-
tages,
intru-
for example, the dangers associated with,
siveness of, and corresponding public dislike for, nondetach-
able automatic belts.
Id., at 28992–28993. Fifth, airbags
brought with them their own special risks to safety, such
as the risk of danger to out-of-position occupants (usually
children) in small cars.
Id., at 28992, 29001; see also 65
Fed. Reg. 30680, 30681–30682 (2000) (ﬁnding 158 conﬁrmed
airbag-induced fatalities as of April 2000, and amending rule