Mothers Against Drunk Driving

You decide to grasp the wheel of a vehicle after being intoxicated with a mind boggling substance. Sip, drive, swerve, hit, kill, are the only things you can mourn as in a flash, a child lay lifeless on the concrete road until it's spirit is released and slaps you across the face for the unfixable mistakes you had made. In 1980, there were 27,000 alcohol related traffic fatalities that had occurred in the United States, with 2,500 in California alone (Phillips). On May 3rd of 1980, that number had risen as the life of Cari Lightner was taken by a repeat drunk driving offender, whose actions caused him to lose control. However, what he didn’t know, was his unforgivable actions were the cause of a life-saving phenomenon. Candy Lightner, Cari’s mother, was infuriated by the tiny amount of consequence the man had received after taking her beloved Cari’s life, and decided that the underestimated laws against drunk driving were not enough to guarantee that the punished killers wouldn't strike again. So, with the help of friends and family, she took charge. On September fifth of 1980, Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) took the world by storm when it was …show more content…
Precipitated by the death of the founders child at the hands of a repeat drunken driving offender, MADD began as a grassroots activist movement (Phillips,Melody) created on September 5th of 1980 from the scolded mind of Candace Lightner. In 1980, an intoxicated hit-and-run driver with four previous drunk driving convictions struck and killed Cari Lightner while she walked with a friend in the bike line in California (Phillips, Melody). While traditional murder at the time was usually handled by jail time or execution, impaired drivers typically only received a judicial “slap on the wrist” for driving while intoxicated, even when the action resulted in fatalities (Phillips,