America Debates Legal drinking Age

New York (ECN) - Earlier this week over 100 U.S. College and University presidents signed a petition urging that the legal drinking age be lowered from 21 to 18.”This is a law that is routinely evaded,” said John McCardell, former president of Middlebury College in Vermont whose organization, the Amethyst Initiative, launched the drive. “It is a law that the people at whom it is directed believe is unjust and unfair and discriminatory.”Laura Dean-Mooney, the president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, sees things differently.”As the mother of a daughter who is close to entering college, it is deeply disappointing to me that many of our education leaders would support an initiative without doing their homework on the underlying research and science. Parents should think twice before sending their teens to these colleges or any others that have waved the white flag on under-age and binge drinking policies,” she said.Somewhere in the middle of those two views is common ground.Supporters of the petition say that lowering the drinking age will curve "binge drinking" which is a huge problem on American campuses.