Jesse White - Illinois Secretary of State

CHEERS to all who backed Illinois graduated driver licensing. Secretary of State Jesse White used National Teen Driver Safety Week to announce that teen driving deaths dropped by more than 50 percent since the law took effect in 2008. Those stricter laws grew out of the Teen Driver Safety Task Force formed in 2006. Among them were increasing driving experience, limiting in-car distractions including number of passengers and cell-phone use and requiring teens to earn their way from one stage to the next by avoiding traffic convictions. Some worried that a few provision were a little too tough. But it"s hard to argue with results when dozens of teens are not being mourned, but preparing for life.