Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) is a national activist organization based out of Texas which advocates for stricter laws to limit alcohol consumption and prevent driving while intoxicated. The organization was established in 1980 by Candace Lightner, the mother of a teenage girl killed by an intoxicated driver. The group has aggressively pushed for legislation to raise the minimum drinking age, implement sobriety checkpoints for drivers, and hold bars and restaurants legally responsible for serving intoxicated customers who later cause car crashes. ¹

MADD has received criticism from nonprofit monitoring organizations, as well as the alcohol beverage industry. The activism watchdog ActivistFacts claims that “MADD began to outgrow its mission” due to its rapid growth and early successes, and that in the early 2000s, the group shifted its focus from combating impaired driving to attacking even limited alcohol consumption before driving. ² The American Beverage Institute, an advocacy group for the alcoholic beverage industry, has come out in opposition to MADD policy proposals such as mandating blood alcohol content (BAC) readers in privately owned vehicles. Lightner has contrasted the group’s current mission with her original intent, calling it “far more neo-prohibitionist than I had ever wanted or envisioned” and saying that she “started MADD to deal with the issue of drunk driving,” not to combat alcohol use in general. ³

In August 2021, the Biden Administration introduced an infrastructure bill which contained a provision mandating BAC sensors. The bill would give the auto industry only three years to start including the sensors in all new vehicles. MADD president Alex Otte praised supporters of the bill for using it as an opportunity to pass new regulations to prevent drinking and driving. ⁴

Background

MADD was founded in September 1980 in Sacramento, California, by Candace Lightner, whose 13-year-old daughter was killed when an intoxicated driver crashed into her. Originally called “Mothers Against Drunk Drivers,” the organization hosted its first national press conference in October of the same year. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan included MADD in his Presidential Commission on Drunk Driving. That year, Reagan signed into law the Howard-Barnes Alcohol Traffic Safety Act, which offered incentives for states to pass laws lowering the legal BAC for drivers from 0.15 percent to 0.1 percent. In 1983, MADD moved its main office to Irving, Texas, and in 1984, the organization changed its name to “Mothers Against Drunk Driving” to clarify that it opposed the behavior in general and was not attacking individual drivers specifically. ⁵

Legislative Impact

Following the passage of the Alcohol Traffic Safety Act, MADD continued to push for more regulations. In 1984, MADD ran a successful activism campaign in favor of the National Minimum Legal Drinking Act, which raised the age for legally purchasing or publicly consuming alcohol from 18 to 21 by targeting federal grants for state highway funding. ⁶ While some states initially declined to enforce the law, all 50 states as well as Washington, D.C., had agreed to do so by 1988. In 1990, the organization started pushing for states to authorize the use of roadside sobriety checkpoints. Since then, 38 states and the District of Columbia authorize law enforcement to operate sobriety checkpoints, but the website for American Addiction Centers notes that some states have maintained that the practice is unconstitutional. In 1995, MADD successfully pushed for a provision of the National Highway Systems Designation Act which incentivized states to implement penalties for drivers under the age of 21 with any amount of alcohol in their system. By 1998, all 50 states had passed laws that were compliant with the measure. In 2001, the organization pushed for a further reduction of the legal BAC limit from 0.1 to 0.08 as part of the 2001 Department of Transportation Appropriations Act. The new limit was put into effect, and all states were in compliance by 2004. ⁷

Societal Impact

Since 1985, MADD has encouraged the public to use the term “crash” instead of “accident” in order to promote the idea that intoxicated drivers bear the primary responsibility for deadly vehicle incidents. The following year, the organization also started to promote the term “designated driver” in order to popularize the practice of having one person in a group stay sober and safely drive intoxicated acquaintances home. The American Addiction Centers, a leading network of substance abuse treatment organizations, have described MADD as “extremely influential, not only in affecting public policy and legislation, but also in changing public perception and social policy.” ⁸

Reactions

Activist Facts, a charity and advocacy group watchdog organization, has disputed both some of MADD’s methods and its effectiveness. For example, MADD organizes what it calls “victim impact panels,” which have become a form of restitution that many courts around the country require convicted drunk drivers to attend. Offenders pay a fee to MADD to attend a meeting where victims of drunk driving accidents tell them their stories. Activist Facts claims that a study of these panels “failed to demonstrated any effect” of the panels on repeat offense rates, including for first-time offenders, for whom MADD claimed the panels were primarily intended. Activist Facts argues that the problem with the organization is that it “has essentially become a public relations organization, and PR campaigns only work on responsible adults,” while “abusers are not affected by slogans.” As a result, the watchdog group says, MADD “ignores the truly drunk drivers” and “instead goes after social drinkers.” ⁹

The Capital Research Center, a right-of-center think tank, has also criticized MADD. In a February 2000 report, the center claimed that the organization’s bureaucracy had drastically expanded starting in the 1980s, which in turn forced it to rely on outside telemarketing firms to raise funds. The center also criticized MADD for allegedly promoting “increased government regulation of alcohol” even as “drunk driving fatalities have declined nationwide.” ¹⁰

Activist Facts cites disputation of some of MADD’s claims by the United States General Accounting Office (GAO), especially GAO’s pushback against a 1998 report by sociologist Ralph Hingson – also a MADD board member – which claimed that lowering the national BAC threshold from 0.1 to 0.08 would result in 500 fewer deaths per year. ¹¹ The GAO labeled Hingson’s claim “unfounded,” citing a number of other factors that, when combined with the lower legal alcohol threshold, created better outcomes. ¹² However, MADD has continued to use his research as an argument in favor of lowering the BAC limit. A Congressional panel also found that “there are no studies that provide evidence” for the effectiveness of MADD’s policy proposal to significantly raise taxes on alcoholic drinks. ¹³

The alcoholic beverage industry has long opposed MADD’s continual push for increased restrictions on alcohol use. In 2010, the American Beverage Institute issued a statement that “the public needs to realize that MADD isn’t the same group it was 20 years ago.” The institute also cited a report by the American Institute of Philanthropy, which gave MADD a “D” rating for devoting a large portion of its budget to salaries and fundraising instead of charitable work such as victim services. ¹⁴ In 2012, then-institute president Sarah Longwell wrote an op-ed for The Hill which condemned the group’s lobbying for laws that would mandate a BAC sensor in every vehicle and require a negative result to start the ignition. ¹⁵ And in 2019, the institute issued a statement opposing MADD’s attempts to have the BAC limit in Michigan lowered from 0.8 to 0.5, calling the effort “an attack on the restaurant and hospitality industries” and accusing MADD of shifting its focus from alcohol abusers to moderate drinkers. ¹⁶

Financials

Throughout the 2010s, MADD received between $30 and $40 million in annual revenue from donations, grants, and program services. In the past, MADD has received sizable contributions from auto insurance companies, including a donation of at least $250,000 from the Allstate Insurance Company and another of at least $100,000 from Nationwide Mutual Insurance. ¹⁷ In 2021, the organization paid the lobbying group ML Strategies at least $40,000 to pressure Congress to pass additional regulations on alcohol consumption. ¹⁸

1. “Effectiveness of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.” American Addiction Centers. March 30, 2020. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.alcohol.org/teens/mothers-against-drunk-driving/
2. Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Activist Facts. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.activistfacts.com/organizations/17-mothers-against-drunk-driving/
3. Sarah Longwell. “Today’s MADD drives dangerous new policies.” The Hill. March 22, 2012. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/civil-rights/217573-sarah-longwell-managing-director-american-beverage-institute
4. Joseph Simonson and Jack McEvoy. “Infrastructure Bill Would Require Alcohol Monitors for All New Cars.” The Washington Free Beacon. August 4, 2021. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://freebeacon.com/politics/infrastructure-bill-would-require-alcohol-monitors-for-all-new-cars/
5. “Effectiveness of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.” American Addiction Centers. March 30, 2020. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.alcohol.org/teens/mothers-against-drunk-driving/
6. “Effectiveness of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.” American Addiction Centers. March 30, 2020. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.alcohol.org/teens/mothers-against-drunk-driving/
7. “Effectiveness of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.” American Addiction Centers. March 30, 2020. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.alcohol.org/teens/mothers-against-drunk-driving/
8. “Effectiveness of Mothers Against Drunk Driving.” American Addiction Centers. March 30, 2020. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.alcohol.org/teens/mothers-against-drunk-driving/
9. Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Activist Facts. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.activistfacts.com/organizations/17-mothers-against-drunk-driving/
10. Martin Morse Walker. “Mothers Against Drunk Driving: Has Its Vision Become Blurred?” Capital Research Center. February 1, 2000. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://capitalresearch.org/article/mothers-against-drunk-driving-has-its-vision-become-blurred/
11. Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Activist Facts. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.activistfacts.com/organizations/17-mothers-against-drunk-driving/
12. U.S. General Accounting Office, “Effectiveness of State .08 Blood Alcohol Laws,” June 1999. Accessed August 15, 2021. RCED-99-179 Highway Safety: Effectiveness of State .08 Blood Alcohol Laws (gao.gov)
13. Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Activist Facts. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.activistfacts.com/organizations/17-mothers-against-drunk-driving/
14. Michael O’Brien. “Beverage group renews its fight with MADD.” The Hill. July 26, 2010. Accessed August 15, 2021. https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/110999-beverage-group-trumpets-report-to-rip-madd?rl=1
15. Sarah Longwell. “Today’s MADD drives dangerous new policies.” The Hill. March 22, 2012. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/civil-rights/217573-sarah-longwell-managing-director-american-beverage-institute
16. “American Beverage Institute Opposes Efforts by MADD to Lower Legal Limit in Michigan.” American Beverage Institute. March 21, 2019. Accessed August 15, 2021. https://abionline.org/press-release/american-beverage-institute-opposes-efforts-by-madd-to-lower-legal-limit-in-michigan/
17. Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Activist Facts. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://www.activistfacts.com/organizations/17-mothers-against-drunk-driving/
18. Joseph Simonson and Jack McEvoy. “Infrastructure Bill Would Require Alcohol Monitors for All New Cars.” The Washington Free Beacon. August 4, 2021. Accessed August 14, 2021. https://freebeacon.com/politics/infrastructure-bill-would-require-alcohol-monitors-for-all-new-cars/