{"id":24541,"date":"2011-06-08T14:32:50","date_gmt":"2011-06-08T14:32:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/the-tester.blawgcloud.com\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/"},"modified":"2026-10-06T18:27:45","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T22:27:45","slug":"maine-bans-texting-while-driving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/","title":{"rendered":"Maine bans texting while driving"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-863\" src=\"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/texting-while-driving-300x199.jpg\" alt=\"texting-while-driving-300x199\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\" \/>Last Friday Maine passed a law to ban texting while driving.\u00a0 The new law, which goes into effect on September 1, 2011, prohibits reading or manually composing any written electronic message while driving.\u00a0 The penalty when the law passed was a $100 fine. Today the fine is not less than $250. A repeat violation within three years brings a fine of not less than $500 and a license suspension of at least 30 days.\u00a0 It is not a crime for which jail can be imposed.\u00a0 It is a traffic violation.<\/p>\n<p>It is interesting that the penalty was only $100 or so for an offense that clearly impairs a person\u2019s ability to drive.\u00a0 In Maine a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/maine-dui-defense\/maine-dui-penalties\/\">DUI carries a penalty<\/a> of 364 days in jail, but the level of impairment is so low that you can be convicted even if the level of alcohol or drugs in your system does not impair your driving in any way.\u00a0 So now if you are weaving down the road texting, the worst that can happen on a first violation is a fine.\u00a0 But if you have a tiny bit of physical impairment from alcohol that does not appreciably affect your driving, you can go to jail for up to 364 days.<\/p>\n<p>Here is the text of the law as it was passed in 2011. It has since been amended, and the fines are higher.<\/p>\n<div class=\"read_more_link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/\"  title=\"Continue Reading Maine bans texting while driving\" class=\"more-link\">Continue Reading \u203a<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last Friday Maine passed a law to ban texting while driving.\u00a0 The new law, which goes into effect on September 1, 2011, prohibits reading or manually composing any written electronic message while driving.\u00a0 The penalty when the law passed was a $100 fine. Today the fine is not less than $250. A repeat violation within [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-texting-while-driving"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Maine Bans Texting While Driving | Webb Law Firm<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Maine prohibits reading or manually composing any written electronic message while driving. The fine today is at least $250.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Maine Bans Texting While Driving | Webb Law Firm\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Maine prohibits reading or manually composing any written electronic message while driving. The fine today is at least $250.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Webb Law Firm\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Maine Bans Texting While Driving | Webb Law Firm","description":"Maine prohibits reading or manually composing any written electronic message while driving. 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The fine today is at least $250.","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Webb Law Firm","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/"},"author":{"name":"Webb Law Firm","@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2a779c0cfb58df839ae19364412f5dc6"},"headline":"Maine bans texting while driving","datePublished":"2011-06-08T14:32:50+00:00","dateModified":"2026-10-06T22:27:45+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/"},"wordCount":402,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/texting-while-driving-300x199.jpg","articleSection":["Texting While Driving"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/","url":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/","name":"Maine Bans Texting While Driving | Webb Law Firm","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/maine-bans-texting-while-driving\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/texting-while-driving-300x199.jpg","datePublished":"2011-06-08T14:32:50+00:00","dateModified":"2026-10-06T22:27:45+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.webblawmaine.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2a779c0cfb58df839ae19364412f5dc6"},"description":"Maine prohibits reading or manually composing any written electronic message while driving. 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