Very tough issue seen from all sides

I’ve been reading the opinions about sobriety checkpoints and people on both sides make excellent points. It’s a tough issue for me, because I am very much a “keep government intrusion into our private lives to a minimum” kinda guy. But I have personal experience with this law, having driven in California for decades and faced the prospect of being stopped at sobriety checkpoints there.

There is probably statistical evidence of life saving benefits to California from its law, but I can’t provide it, only personal experience. In my younger days there were times when I did not drive drunk solely because I knew those checkpoints were out there and I didn’t catch the location announcements from the radio or newspaper. My handing over the keys for that reason may have saved lives. I knew friends who were very drunk when removed from the road by checkpoints.

I’ve carried caskets of friends and loved ones due to drunk drivers. I know people who ruined lives, including their own, by driving drunk. Many of us do.

Much has been written lately about making road improvements to prevent loss of life. We will rightly spend huge amounts of money to save precious lives. Checkpoints will probably save more lives than those other worthy solutions. I don’t know of anyone who at a philosophical level wants an unrequested personal intrusion by authorities without just cause. It is counterintuitive to the core of freedom under our democracy. At a practical level, it’s hard to swallow. It really comes down to whether we want to take more drunks off the road, and reduce the carnage, enough to potentially suffer this unearned indignity. I do. And if most of us do, then a law should be enacted that is modeled after others that have withstood constitutional scutiny.

Charles Braun