Child Restraint Laws for All 50 States
2009 May 18
The Highway Loss Data Institute at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety maintains a website that details the child restraint laws for all 50 states. The Institute explains:
All 50 states and the District of Columbia have child restraint laws. Child restraint laws require children to travel in approved child restraint devices, and some permit or require older children to use adult safety belts. The age at which belts can be used instead of child restraints differs among the states. Young children usually are covered by child restraint laws, while safety belt laws cover older children and adults. Because enforcement and fines differ under belt use and child restraint laws, it’s important to know which law is being violated when a child isn’t restrained.Ideally, all infants and children in all vehicles should be covered by safety belt laws or child restraint laws or both. But differences in the way the laws in various states are worded result in many occupants, especially children, being covered by neither law. Lawmakers are eliminating these gaps by amending their child restraint and safety belt laws. They also should make certain that police can stop drivers to enforce restraint laws covering older children. All children younger than 16 in 41 states and the District of Columbia are covered by one, or both laws.
