page_title: National Maximum Speed Law
section_title: 1973—55 mph National Speed Limit
hierarchical_section_title: National Maximum Speed Law / 1973—55 mph National Speed Limit
caption_attribution_description: Original Caption: Highway Sign Along Interstate #5 Shows the 50 Mile an Hour Limit Imposed by Officials in That State as Well as Oregon before a Federal Order Asked Motorists Throughout the Nation to Slow Down 11/1973 U.S. National Archives’ Local Identifier: 412-DA-12968 Photographer: Falconer, David Subjects: Environmental Protection Agency Project DOCUMERICA Persistent URL: https://arcweb.archives.gov/arc/action/ExternalIdSearch?id=555420 Repository: Still Picture Records Section, Special Media Archives Services Division (NWCS-S), National Archives at College Park, 8601 Adelphi Road, College Park, MD, 20740-6001. For information about ordering reproductions of photographs held by the Still Picture Unit, visit: www.archives.gov/research/order/still-pictures.html Reproductions may be ordered via an independent vendor. NARA maintains a list of vendors at www.archives.gov/research/order/vendors-photos-maps-dc.html Access Restrictions: Unrestricted Use Restrictions: Unrestricted
context_page_description: The National Maximum Speed Law was a provision of the federal government of the United States 1974 Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act that prohibited speed limits higher than 55 miles per hour. It was drafted in response to oil price spikes and supply disruptions during the 1973 oil crisis and remained the law until 1995.
  While federal officials hoped gasoline consumption would fall by 2.2%, the actual savings were estimated at between 0.5% and 1%.
  The law was widely disregarded by motorists nationwide, and some states opposed the law, but many jurisdictions discovered it to be a major source of revenue. Actions ranged from proposing deals for an exemption to de-emphasizing speed limit enforcement. The NMSL was modified in 1987 and 1988 to allow up to 65 mph limits on certain limited-access rural roads. Congress repealed the NMSL in 1995, fully returning speed limit-setting authority to the individual states.
  The law's safety benefit is disputed as research found conflicting results.
  The power to set speed limits historically belonged to the states. Prior to the NMSL, the sole exception to this occurred during World War II, when the U.S.
context_section_description: As of November 20, 1973, several states had modified speed limits:
  50 mph (80 km/h): Rhode Island, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Vermont, and Washington
  55 mph (89 km/h): North Carolina and Oregon
  California lowered some 70 mph (110 km/h) limits to 65 mph (105 km/h).
  In late November 1973, Texas Governor Dolph Briscoe recommended adoption of a 55 mph (89 km/h) statewide limit. On December 4, the Texas Highway Commission, with a 3–0 vote, adopted this 55 mph (89 km/h) speed limit, citing unsafe speed differentials between the flow of traffic and people driving too slowly to comply with Nixon's and Briscoe's requests for voluntary slowdowns. The legality of the measure was questioned, and two Texas legislators threatened to sue to block the limit. By December 6, Texas Attorney General John Hill ruled that the speed reduction "'was in excess' of the commissioners' legal power," citing that a 1943 Texas Attorney General's opinion held that the legislature holds the power to set the statewide speed limit and the Commission's authority was limited to changing it in specific locales where safety factors required lower limits.
  As an emergency response to the 1973 oil crisis, on November 26, 1973, President Richard Nixon proposed a national 50 mph (80 km/h) speed limit for passenger vehicles and a 55 mph (90 km/h) speed limit for trucks and buses. Also proposed were a ban on ornamental lighting, no gasoline sales on Sunday, and a 15% cut in gasoline production to reduce total gas consumption by 200,000 barrels a day, representing a 2.2% drop from annualized 1973 gasoline consumption levels. Nixon partly based that on a belief that cars achieve maximum efficiency between 40 and 50 mph (64 and 80 km/h) and that trucks and buses were most efficient at 55 mph (89 km/h).
  The California Trucking Association, the largest trucking association in the United States, opposed differential speed limits on grounds that they are "not wise from a safety standpoint."
caption: In 1973, Congress enacted a national speed limit of 55 mph (89 km/h). Some states, such as Washington, enacted lower speed limits.
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