Daylight saving time is back – so is the debate
“With all that’s going wrong in the world, let’s at least make the clocks work.” Scott Yates “Time activist” who wants to end clock changing
Love it or hate it, our annual ritual of early March – changing our clocks to daylight saving time – is coming at 2 a.m. Sunday.
That means it’s also time for another annual ritual: the debate over springing forward (in March) and falling back (in November). While some people love the daylight at the end of the day as the weather warms, others bemoan the loss of an hour’s sleep.
One “time activist,” Scott Yates of Denver, wants us to “end the barbarism of changing the clock twice a year.” Yates, who promotes the hashtag #LocktheClock, said momentum for ending the time change is stronger now than ever before.
“With all that’s going wrong in the world, let’s at least make the clocks work,” he wrote on his website.
Fifteen states have enacted legislation to make daylight saving time or standard time year-round, he said: California, Florida, Delaware, Louisiana, Maine, Oregon, Idaho, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Washington, Arkansas, Georgia, Ohio and Wyoming.
The stumbling block for fans of yearround daylight saving is the federal 1966 Uniform Time Act, which became law because of the random way states had been observing daylight saving time up until then. The act said states either have to change the clocks to daylight saving time at a specified time and day or stick with standard time throughout the year. The only power individual states or territories have under the act is to opt out of daylight saving time, putting them on standard time permanently, such as what Arizona, Hawaii, Guam, American Samoa, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands do.
Any proposals that would establish permanent daylight saving time would require Congress to amend the act.
The U.S. first implemented daylight saving during World War I as a way to conserve fuel as part of the Standard Time Act of 1918, also known as the Calder Act. After World War I, Congress abolished summer daylight saving at the federal level, although it remained a local option, with some states continuing to observe it.
The Department of Transportation, which is in charge of all time zones in the U.S., says daylight saving conserves energy, saves lives by preventing traffic accidents and reduces crime. Proponents of year-round standard time say it balances morning and evening daylight, which makes sleeping and waking easier.