WASHINGTON — Five decades after Richard Nixon signed legislation to place the U.S. on daylight saving time, Congress is again flirting with the concept despite historical warnings.
Legislation that cleared the House on Tuesday, 308-117, would make daylight savings time — observed from March to November — permanent.
“Stopping the twice-yearly time change benefits the health and well-being of all Americans,” said Rep. Frank Pallone (D-6th), arguing in favor of the bill. Changing the clocks in the spring and fall is linked to heart attacks and strokes in “the days immediately following,” said Pallone.
Pallone, whose Monmouth County-area home base relies on coastal tourism, said embracing daylight saving time could be a local financial boon. “Extra sunlight means more time at the beach, more time eating out at restaurants and more time doing outdoor leisure activities.”
New Jersey’s congressional delegation split on the bill, which faces an uncertain future in the Senate. Pallone and seven other New Jerseyans in the House voted for it, while Reps. Donald Norcross (D-1st), Chris Smith (R-4th), Tom Kean Jr. (R-7th) and Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-12th) voted against the measure.
Lawmakers in recent Congresses, led largely by members from tourism-dependent states like Florida, have repeatedly failed to make daylight saving time permanent.
Former lawmaker Marco Rubio from Florida passed legislation through the Senate in March 2022 with a unanimous consent request, when no member objected. That measure languished and never reached the desk of then-President Joe Biden.
Legislation pending in the state Assembly and Senate would make daylight saving time permanent in New Jersey. It has yet to gain a committee hearing.
Circadian rhythm
The twice-a-year time change is bad for health because it shakes up natural human rhythms, according to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. The “seasonal time changes should be abolished in favor of a fixed, national, year-round standard time,” the academy said in October 2020, about two weeks before clocks were set back an hour.
Credit: (Hackensack Meridian Health)Such a system “aligns best with human circadian biology and provides distinct benefits for public health and safety,” the group, a professional society of sleep experts, said at the time.
A permanent switch to daylight saving time could severely alter circadian rhythm — the body’s internal clock — and the external signals the body processes. That sort of shift could lead to what sleep researchers call social jet lag, which is “associated with an increased risk of obesity, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease and depression,” the authors wrote in an expansive review published by the National Institutes of Health.
“Our circadian rhythm is designed to be exposed to bright light when we get up in the morning, and it’s supposed to start getting darker in the evening, causing dim light melatonin secretion, which for most people starts around 7 p.m.,” Adrian Pristas, director of sleep medicine at Hackensack Meridian Health, said in a statement. “If we have too much bright light in the evening, like we do during daylight saving season, our body won’t produce the melatonin it needs to fall asleep in a timely manner, resulting in negative health impacts including increased cardiovascular incidents and mood disorders.”
Less crime
Some states, like Alaska and Hawaii, follow permanent standard time because of their geography. Under the bill that cleared the House, that would continue, Pallone said.
Whipping support for the bill, Pallone cited a 2015 Brookings Institution study that found lower crime rates as a result of extra daylight.
“All those kids that are on their way to school — it increases the likelihood that they’ll get hit.” — Rep. Chris Smith
“Making that extra sunlight permanent will help keep our communities safer,” Pallone said.
In 1973, Congress voted overwhelmingly — 311-88 in the House, 68-10 in the Senate — to make daylight saving time the national standard. The White House occupant at the time, Richard Nixon, signed the bill into law on Dec. 15, 1973.
After the change left school kids that winter waiting in the dark for their rides to school, or even walking to class on dark mornings, Congress swiftly reversed course.
By August 1974, the Senate had decided by voice vote to end the time change, and by October, Nixon replacement Gerald Ford had signed legislation to return the country to the prior time schedule.
‘I don’t get it’
On 67 days of the year, the sun does not rise in New Jersey until after 8 a.m., said Smith, the 4th District Republican. The law would mean more mornings in the dark — a safety risk, in his eyes.
“All those kids that are on their way to school — it increases the likelihood that they’ll get hit,” Smith said in an interview with NJ Spotlight News. “It’s all about the school kids.”
The vote this week baffled Smith, given the 1970s history. “It was repudiated because it didn’t work. So what’s this? I don’t get it,” he said.
Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-5th) voted for the bill after hearing input from the public he represents, he said.
“It wasn’t one of these 90-10 issues,” Gottheimer said in an interview with NJ Spotlight News, noting that the bill faces difficult odds in the Senate. “The Senate’s going to have a different perspective on this.”
