As the article points out, "auto safety" itself has had a huge push from consumer advocates at least since Ralph Nader highlighted the risks of car design defects in the 1960s.
That said, a few points about the law and auto safety:
1. U.S. law is tied to individual responsibility for conduct that is wrongful. As the auto industry developed over the past century, that meant that those who sought to drive by what the law declared to be the rules of the road were deemed to have done something wrong only if they failed to meet a reasonable standard of care in driving - that is, if they were negligent, careless, inexcusably inattentive, or otherwise failed to exercise a sufficient degree of caution that they created safety risks to others owing to their manner of driving. Breaking rules (e.g., speeding, driving the wrong way on a one-way street, and like items) constituted one such failure to exercise proper caution. In such cases, the law developed so as to hold such drivers responsible for damages in civil proceedings for the what the law called the "tort" of negligence. A tort is a civil wrong by which the actor committing the tort ("tortfeasor") is responsible to pay in damages for all harm caused by his tortious activity. In layman's terms involving cars, this generally means careless conduct. If the degree of wrongdoing is more egregious than mere carelessness, as for example when teenagers in the 1950s used to drag race through city streets in a way that constituted reckless conduct (that is, conduct by which the wrongdoer deliberately does things that have a high risk of endangering public safety), the consequence of this to the wrongdoer is also a civil wrong for which damages will lie but it is also (usually) defined as a criminal act by which the person can be prosecuted, fined, or jailed as a consequence of such actions. As the intent to harm increases even further, such as an act by which someone deliberately seeks to inflict harm on another while using a car as an instrument of harm, this can constitute a serious crime such as murder (for example, when someone deliberately drives at high speed into a crowd of people and does so with intent to harm or kill others).
2. Underlying the system of law that has developed around accountability for auto-related collisions, fatalities, etc. is a social policy judgment that sees automobiles as a positive good for society. The article notes that such social policy judgments were made over the years more and more in favor of promoting more expansive use of the automobile at the expense of pedestrians and mass transit riders who might also use the roads, especially in urban environments. This undoubtedly happened, though it is a dubious assertion to say that some sort of sinister forces ("Motordom" is the term used in the article) made this happen in some way that somehow overrode the will of ordinary people. I am old enough to remember as a kid how people perceived automobiles in, say, the late 1950s, and there is no doubt from my personal recollection that average people rejoiced and celebrated ever-increasing uses of the high-speed automobile, cheered on the National Highway Act by which old two-lane state roads were sent into relative disuse through the creation of a vast network of interstate freeways, and, as a matter of culture, broadly celebrated what was called the "car culture." Even dissidents of the time, such as Jack Kerouac, though a counter-culture figure of his time, broadly promoted the idea of freedom in driving the open road. If anyone in that era would have suggested that cars be shut down or limited in favor of bikes, they would have been laughed at by the average person. Such ideas were basically considered crank ideas and had no form of popular support whatever. Therefore, it did not take a secret plot by General Motors (or whomever) to get people to push widespread auto use. People wanted to get away from cities generally, wanted to live in the suburbs that were growing rapidly at the time, and wanted the freedom to use cars to get around whenever and wherever they wanted with limited restrictions other than having to obey the rules of the road. Yes, individual cities deployed mass transit with varying degrees of widespread use but these were limited to a few highly localized areas. People generally wanted cars, and mainly cars, to get around.
3. So, coming to the themes of this piece, "auto safety" is one such theme and the idea of the automobile being inherently "murderous" certainly tries to highlight this theme. Yet I would say the broader theme is actually more one of saying that the rules of the road should be rewritten to strike a different social policy judgment about how roads are used. It is nowhere stated in the article, but is strongly implied, that perhaps drivers of automobiles should be subjected to stronger legal consequences than those currently existing in the event they collide with others in using a road. Given that we are here in the realm of social policy, and not existing law, this could mean almost anything. For example, it could mean strict liability for damages if you hit someone using a car, no matter what the circumstances and regardless of what the law now calls "fault." This is what happened to the law in other areas over recent decades, most notably with the expansion of strict product liability law by which manufactures (who at one time could be held liable for injuries resulting from use of their products only if the injured party could show that the manufacturer was negligent or otherwise at "fault" in making the product) had their liabilities dramatically broadened if injuries resulted from use of their products. As the law evolved in that area, the courts and legislatures eventually determined that manufacturers should be held liable regardless of fault if their products could be shown to have inherent "defects" (broadly defined). This led to a huge expansion of liability for manufacturing such products and, for example, pretty much decimated certain industries such as manufacturers of small aircraft. As a matter of social policy, the same could be done with the idea of driving an automobile. Courts and legislatures could determine that it is socially desirable that drivers be held strictly liable regardless of fault because this would promote greater driver safety and would also strike a balance in shared road usage that favors pedestrians and others more than drivers. They could also define as a crime any collision by which a motorist acts carelessly in a way that results in death or injury. They could impose strict penalties, such as losing the right to drive upon the occurrence of even one such event. This sort of change - or any other like it - would have huge social consequences for the vast majority of primarily suburban drivers who do in fact continue to value having the ability to drive freely about as their primary means of transportation. Young people flocking to cities in favor of "upscale urban lifestyles" (and others who have a particular viewpoint, in the case of such young people in favor of mass transit over cars) may see the issue differently. But the law ultimately is driven by the average people who elect politicians, etc. and I would suspect will be slow to change in this respect.
4. The article also expresses concern about high speeds and about drivers themselves being at risk of death or serious injury in driving the so-called murderous machines. While it is true that high speeds clearly enlarge such risks, it is a bit disingenuous to claim this as a primary concern while simultaneously forcing cars to be made smaller and smaller out of concern for increasing car mileage per gallon and promoting environmental goals. In modern public policy making, the same people who try to flog the auto companies for endangering drivers for this or that reason are often the first to decree that cars be made smaller and smaller even though this might create increasing safety risks to drivers who wind up in accidents. Again, this is a matter of social policy, and there are lots of arguments for why smaller cars promote broader social goals, but I rarely hear the people insisting on smaller cars acknowledge that an inherent by-product of this is to increase safety risks in case of collision (perhaps I am wrong on this point but I am going from memory in saying that this is indeed a known consequence of shrinking the car size).
The real battle here is over a strong push to have the law conform to the modern urban trends favoring bike riders, transit riders, and pedestrians over automobiles. That issue should be addressed head on by assessing not only the potential benefits of limiting auto use but also the social costs (which I believe could be substantial). The article does not do that and is flawed because of this, notwithstanding its (many) interesting points made along the way.
