From a reader…
QUAERITUR:
I am a leadfoot driver, have been for decades. My wife says I could have been an Indy racer. My driving record is solidly good and I drive a well-handling sedan. To limit speeding, I set my cruise control on the highway at 10 miles above speed limit, which seems to me where about 40% of the other drivers are at (another 40% set it at 5 above, 10% maybe go exactly the speed limit, and the last 10% go even faster than I do). However, some times when I’m on a very long trip or impatient to get home, I will go as much at 15 miles over speed limit, and that’s when my conscience starts to bother me. Is this sinful? How sinful is it? What do the manuals say? I tried to find something in Prummer but there was nothing (as far as I could see).
We can start by making a distinction. There are different kinds of laws. There are laws which come from God and those which come from man. Those which are man-made laws reflect what Augustine talks about in City of God: they are, in a sense, punishment for the Fall. Also, they present to us a much lower bar except insofar as we don’t also thereby violate God’s laws. I recall from my study of St. Augustine that he finds no exception to the commandment against lying. On the other hand, I recall a debate online between the esteemed Janet Smith and … someone else, a religious I think, maybe a Dominican, about whether there are exceptions: Can one lie to a Gestapo Jew hunter about the Jews you are hiding in your attic? The answer is… yes, probably. It can be complicated, especially if your own family’s lives are on the line.
Back to speeding.
Speeding laws are sort of “one-size fits all” laws. But that’s not reality. There are times when you need to get to the hospital, for example. There are times when driving the posted limit can make you the hazard on the Interstate. Moreover, as you mention there is praxis to consider. It seems like a social convention that LEOs allow some fudging, up to a certain point (5-10 mph). Unless they don’t in Black Duck County. Then you pay a penalty. You can always challenge in traffic court and argue that your wife was having a baby (if that was true).
However, it seems that even though speeding laws seem to be one-size-fits-all laws, they seem also to be just laws, established by (in most places) legitimate authority and they seek to uphold the common good by keeping motorists, pedestrians and property safe. The spirit of speed limits is clearly for the sake of safety.
Except when it wasn’t. Do I remember correctly that once there was a 55 mph limit for the sake of saving fuel? However, in states like Montana, limits were not posted because… well… driving in Montana takes a while. The national imposed limit was certainly more honored in the breach than the observance. It seems that a law that cannot be enforced in the face of mass violation is no law at all.
Sinful and how sinful? Hard to say. All things being equal, it seems that so long as your driving doesn’t endanger the common good, giving the social conventions, some additional mph are probably not mortally sinful. Much also depends on attitude: why are you speeding? Is it from contempt for the law and the rights of others to a safe roadway or is it from the fact that you were just struck by a nasty case of food poisoning? Is it that you pay little or no attention while driving or because you are, precisely, paying attention and you see that the majority of drivers, including large trucks are going quite a bit faster than the posted signs and that you are becoming a hazard? The negative attitude about your speed could shift the immortality of the instance of speeding over into the mortal sin category.
To conclude, here some Sammy Hagar from that mostly awful decade of the 1980’s. Just to make a point, the subject in the lyrics is clearly committing mortal sins.
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When you cross the Coutts/Sweetgrass Canadian/US border into Montana there is a speed limit sign of 70 mph. I’ve always rounded it up to 120 km/h without incident. Not sure what the deal was back in 2010 in Illinois with its 60 mph limit on the interstate when crossing over from Minnesota. Beautiful smooth multi lane highway and pitifully slow speed limit. That’s not even 100 km/h. We do 110 km/h on the narrow poorly maintained undivided highways in Saskatchewan without issue.
Is going the exact speed limit, just because I enjoy making people mad, a sin?
This was great. Thanks, quite helpful.
The big joke in my family and with friends is that I drive slow. I have driven cross country many times and most of my local work is about an hour and a half away.I HAVE NO MOVING VIOLATIONS! One time My Daughter who was known for driving fast and hard was driving with my Wife and Granddaughters. I was following with My Grandsons. They looked and noticed that I drive the Speed Limit. I explained that speeding in cities and towns doesn’t get you to your location any faster because of lights, stop signs and traffic. As My Daughter went speeding and breaking to our destination, we pulled in right behind her. On the Highways which I drive everyday, I see many more accidents than in the past. Almost always in the Passing Lane and usually 5 car pile ups.
Remember, Don’t drive faster than Your Guardian Angel can fly.
The Fr Z garnished with a dollop of humor is my favorite Fr Z and has been for years. It’s scary to think back how many years by now. Ribbon insurance anyone?
Some traditional moral theologians spoke of “merely penal laws”. These are general human laws, which enjoin or forbid something that is for the common good, but also is so general that a minor violation cannot be said to violate a specific virtue and so these do not oblige in conscience. However, due to the respect owed to the authority promulgating, if penalized, the penalty must be observed because of the 4th Commandment/Virtue of Piety.
Examples would include many traffic laws (which violation does not specifically cause undue danger to self or others), building codes, zoning restriction, HOA rules, etc.
Obviously, there is a difference in letting your yard get so trashy that the neighbors’ home values are diminished, and planting some roses of an unapproved colour. Similarly, 10-over and 40-over are different classes of violations.
Some others deny the possibility of such “merely penal laws” and would argue that these rules do oblige in conscience, but usually not in any grave manner.
Since solid theologians argue on both sides, one certainly can side with either without fault.
But, no matter which is true, what certainly is true is that one does have to pay the penalty if caught (though obviously one could try to, still respecting the authority, try to get the court to dismiss the ticket).
Caveat aurigator!
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Reverend Fr Andrew,
very helpful answer, thank you.
I would of course argue that who can do more can do less, i. e. who can oblige under mortal sin can oblige under venial sin, and who can oblige in conscience at all can oblige merely to pay penalties.
All the more since otherwise, this would clearly be a case for St. Thomas’s Summa, II/II 105 obj.3: “No one is bound to do the impossible: wherefore if a superior makes a heap of precepts and lays them upon his subjects, so that they are unable to fulfil them, they are excused from sin. Wherefore superiors should refrain from making a multitude of precepts.” Superiors these days are not, like they maybe used to (but St. Thomas wrote even that in the Middle Ages), likely to come along every now and then with a really pressing order about something really important, which then does bind under mortal sin. The have, to say with a slight exaggeration, a habit of ruling their subjects’ lives with regulations as far as they can, and when God even counts white lies (actual lies, to think of it) as venial, that cannot possibly be mortal, barring perhaps if they explicitly said so. (As I am a German, I cannot but help to notice that our own legal theory explicitly calls the class of what was once called crimes we are talking about, “Ordnungswidrigkeiten” or contraventions, as lacking the moral reproachability that applies to actual crimes. Translated into Catholic language, this means “I, the state, do not command this under sin”. Which is all the better; not only speeding, but actually crossing a street diagonally when no cars are present is technically an ordnungswidrigkeit.
Note: This concerns the element of disobedience alone. Actual danger or disturbing others is obviously a different matter.
– As also the inquirer seems to instinctively feel, having no qualm at all about the 10 mph but having some about the 15 mph. That he does so while credibly insisting [*] that even so there is no danger present might be explained as “the overstepping of rules, even when not sinful disobedience, should still be subject to the virtue of moderation and I might be exaggerating that”; a rather interesting idea, but in any case such-like would be venial.
[* It is credible also because of how low the American speed limits for those beautiful broad highways with little traffic are, from all I heard. I know we are the exception on the other side of the scale, but 120 km/h or some 75 mph is a common European thing, and those are smaller and curvier roads with way more traffic.]
As a police officer I’ll tell you that in my jurisdiction we don’t even stop anyone for less than 12 (and sometimes 15) over the limit unless there are aggravating factors involved. Sometimes going exactly the speed limit is annoying, and I’ve pulled over a ton of people for going too slowly (yes it’s a thing, and, at certain times of night, is actually one of the main signs of a drunk driver). Speed laws are written with the understanding that they will be frequently violated, and some leeway is built into enforcement policies. That said, there’s a difference between 10-15 over on an empty highway and 10-15 over in a school zone during dismissal.
I agree with Father, but there are some countries which no speed limits on certain stretches. Also, in this same country, Germany, the drivers are competent, unlike American drivers. All must absolve a rigorous driving school with written exams and driving exams which used to last a year and cost a pretty penny. But after going to this school, a German can safely tailgate you and not hit your car. Although now tailgating has been made illegal even in Germany. I do not trust American drivers to know what they are doing. In my state, even the old ladies drive 5-10 miles an hour over the speed limit. Reckless driving is the problem, not speeding. I know some who like to drive 100 miles an hour into the city, but they are very competent. Speeding during a white out (blizzard) and then passing into the oncoming lane of traffic on a two lane road is quite common here. That could be sinful in my thinking.