SENATE, No. 1938

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

INTRODUCED MARCH 20, 1997

By Senators BASSANO, CONNORS and Kosco

An Act concerning the use of telephones in motor vehicles and supplementing Title 39 of the Revised Statues.

    Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:

    1. A driver shall not operate a telephone in a motor vehicle that is in motion. A person who violates the provisions of this act shall be fined $50.

    2. This act shall take effect immediately.

STATEMENT

    This bill prohibits the driver of a motor vehicle from using a mobile telephone while the motor vehicle is in motion. Violators would be fined $50.

    Motorists who use telephones while driving are endangering themselves, their passengers and other motorists. A Canadian study, recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that talking on a car phone made a driver just as likely to have an accident as driving while almost legally drunk. Researchers found that the chances of having an accident were quadrupled, even when the driver was using a hands-free telephone. The study suggested that it was driver inattention rather than the physical act of dialing that caused accidents.

Prohibits use of car phone while driving.