{"id":2634029,"date":"2026-07-23T08:49:57","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T12:49:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/congress-should-think-twice-before-messing-with-our-clocks\/"},"modified":"2026-07-23T08:53:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T12:53:13","slug":"congress-should-think-twice-before-messing-with-our-clocks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/congress-should-think-twice-before-messing-with-our-clocks\/","title":{"rendered":"Congress Should Think Twice Before Messing With Our Clocks"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fcongress-should-think-twice-before-messing-with-our-clocks%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2634029&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The article discusses the recent passage of the Sunshine Protection Act of 2025 by the House of Representatives, which proposes making Daylight Saving Time permanent. It critiques this idea, highlighting that while it extends evening daylight in summer, it would cause problematic late sunrises during winter months across much of the United States. the author explains the natural relationship between the sun&#8217;s position, daylight hours, and timekeeping, emphasizing that shifting clocks year-round would lead to excessively dark winter mornings, affecting daily life, safety, and well-being. Conversely, eliminating Daylight Saving Time altogether would result in very early summer sunrises, which may also be undesirable. The article argues that the current method-switching between standard time and daylight saving period-is well balanced, offering the benefits of extended evening daylight without the drawbacks of winter darkness. It also points out that past efforts to implement year-round Daylight Saving Time,such as in 1973,were short-lived due to public backlash. Ultimately,the article suggests that while Daylight Saving Time improves summer enjoyment,applying it permanently during winter is impractical and potentially harmful,urging the Senate to reconsider the legislation.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Congress can\u2019t seem to figure out how to exercise its constitutional authority to pass fiscally responsible budgets, declare war, or do most of the other things that the American founders intended for it to do.\u00a0But when it comes to messing with the time of day, Congress seemingly can\u2019t resist. <\/p>\n<p>On July 14, the House of Representatives passed the so-called Sunshine Protection Act of 2025.\u00a0The bill, which \u201cprotects\u201d sunshine in the evening at the expense of sunshine in the morning, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/daylight-saving-time-permanent-house-vote\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">passed<\/a> by a large margin (308-117) but with little apparent consideration of its consequences.\u00a0In the hopes that the Senate will engage in more serious debate on this matter, here are a few suggestions of things it should consider:<\/p>\n<p>The <em>American Heritage Dictionary<\/em> defines \u201cnoon\u201d as \u201cmidday,\u201d as the \u201ctime or point in the sun\u2019s path at which the sun is on the local meridian,\u201d and as the \u201chighest point; the zenith.\u201d\u00a0So, noon is the time of day when the sun is most straight overhead.\u00a0At least that\u2019s true on standard time.<\/p>\n<p>With the sun overhead at midday, it follows that the number of hours of daylight is equal on either side of noon.\u00a0In March or September, when days are roughly 12 hours long, the sun rises at about 6 a.m. and sets at about 6 p.m. \u2014 again, on standard time.\u00a0This even distribution of sunlight \u2014 half in the morning, half after noon \u2014 is convenient, as most people want to enjoy as much daylight as possible in the evening without having to start their day in the dark.<\/p>\n<p>But this equation shifts in the late spring and summertime, when the days are long.\u00a0If there are, say, 15 hours of daylight in June (the exact number depends on one\u2019s latitude), then the sun naturally rises at about 4:30 a.m. and sets at about 7:30 p.m.\u00a0Most Americans, no longer living on farms, have little desire to be awakened by sunlight coming through their window at 4:30 in the morning.\u00a0So, they\u2019d rather \u201cadd\u201d an hour to the evening daylight, extending it to 8:30 p.m., while having the sun rise an hour later in the morning.\u00a0This is accomplished by switching to Daylight Saving Time, which moves clocks forward an hour. <\/p>\n<p>Under Daylight Saving Time, 4:30 a.m. is relabeled as 5:30 a.m., noon is relabeled as 1 p.m., and so on.\u00a0As a result, the sun is no longer directly overhead at noon \u2014 it\u2019s overhead at 1 p.m., instead \u2014 but summertime daylight is apportioned more to most people\u2019s liking.<\/p>\n<p>Moving the clocks forward an hour doesn\u2019t work so well, however, in the late fall and wintertime, when days are short.\u00a0As Sen. Tom Cotton <a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/homenews\/house\/5968255-house-sunshine-protection-act-daylight-saving-time\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">observed<\/a>, applying Daylight Saving Time year-round would \u201cpush winter sunrises to an absurdly late hour,\u201d and \u201ckids would either walk to school in the pitch black or schools would have to push back start times.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sen. Cotton is absolutely right.\u00a0For example, if there are, say, 9 hours of daylight in December, the sun rises at about 7:30 a.m. and sets at about 4:30 p.m.\u00a0Shifting clocks to Daylight Saving Time would mean that the sun wouldn\u2019t rise until roughly 8:30 in the morning in the late fall or winter.<\/p>\n<p>In many places, the effect would be even worse. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeanddate.com\/sun\/usa\/omaha?month=12&#038;year=2026\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">According<\/a> to <a href=\"http:\/\/timeanddate.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">timeanddate.com<\/a>, in Omaha, Nebraska, the sun wouldn\u2019t rise before 8:45 a.m. for 31 consecutive days (Dec. 20 to Jan. 19).\u00a0It wouldn\u2019t rise before 8:45 a.m. for 39 consecutive days in Salt Lake City (Dec. 16 to Jan. 23), 47 consecutive days in Seattle (Dec. 9 to Jan. 24), 59 consecutive days in Detroit (Dec. 5 to Feb. 1), and 94 consecutive days \u2014 more than three months \u2014 in Bismark, North Dakota (Nov. 15 to Feb. 16).<\/p>\n<p>On Christmas morning, the sun wouldn\u2019t rise until 9:12 a.m. in Grand Rapids, Michigan, 9:20 a.m. in Missoula, Montana, and 9:34 a.m. in Minot, North Dakota. <\/p>\n<p>As far south as Atlanta (where it would always be light by 8:45 a.m.), the sun wouldn\u2019t rise before 8:30 a.m. for 61 consecutive days (from Dec. 8 to Feb. 6).\u00a0Even in Miami, perhaps the major city where this change would make the most sense, the sun now rises by 7:30 a.m. almost every single day of the year \u2014 it will do so on 364 of the next 365 days (all but March 14, 2027, when it will rise at 7:31 a.m.).\u00a0Under permanent Daylight Saving Time, however, the sun wouldn\u2019t rise before 8:00 A.M. in Miami for 56 consecutive days (Dec. 16 to Feb. 9), matching the number of days in Joe DiMaggio\u2019s hitting streak.<\/p>\n<p>In short, adopting Daylight Saving Time year-round would make winter mornings rather dark and depressing across America.<\/p>\n<p>Eliminating Daylight Saving Time altogether, another proposal floated by some, would present the opposite problem \u2014 too much sun during summertime mornings, achieved at the expense of evening sun.\u00a0On standard time, the sun would rise before 4:30 a.m. in New York City during the entire month of June, while it would set by around 7:30 \u2014 versus rising an hour later and setting at about 8:30 under the current arrangement. <\/p>\n<p>As these examples demonstrate, the current scenario of having Daylight Saving Time be in effect for about 8 months of the year \u2014 from early March through October, but not during the winter months \u2014 works quite well for most Americans.\u00a0Under this arrangement, Americans enjoy as much sun as possible in the evenings while still having sun in the mornings.\u00a0The small price we pay for that pleasant outcome is having to change our clocks on 2 nights out of 365. <\/p>\n<p>Those who find this too challenging would surely find it more difficult to spend their winter mornings in darkness.<\/p>\n<p>Instituting permanent Daylight Saving Time on a nationwide basis is really just the same thing as shifting everybody one time zone to the east.\u00a0When places on Pacific Standard Time, for example, switch to Daylight Saving Time, they are effectively shifting to Mountain Standard Time.\u00a0So, Los Angeles moves to Denver\u2019s time, while Denver moves to Chicago\u2019s, Chicago to New York\u2019s, and New York to Nova Scotia\u2019s.\u00a0Again, this works well in the summer and for most of the spring and fall, but effectively shifting one time zone to the east doesn\u2019t work so well when the sun is in the Southern Hemisphere and there\u2019s no extra sunlight to \u201csave.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Florida Rep. Vern Buchanan, who introduced the Sunshine Protection Act in the House, <a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/homenews\/house\/5968255-house-sunshine-protection-act-daylight-saving-time\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">claims<\/a> that \u201cthe evidence is clear that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/rubio-pushes-for-year-round-daylight-saving-time\/\" title=\"Rubio Pushes for Year...Round ...\">permanent daylight saving time<\/a> can improve public health\u201d and \u201creduce traffic accidents.\u201d\u00a0But it\u2019s quite hard to see how having people get up in the dead of winter and drive to work or school in the dark is conducive to either of these two results. <\/p>\n<p>We\u2019re living in an era in which policymakers seem to feel the need to repeat the failed experiments of the 1960s and 1970s \u2014 such as not enforcing laws in our cities and wondering why <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/opinion\/the-urban-crime-spike-is-real-555b7410?mod=opinion_lead_pos5\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">crime rises<\/a>.\u00a0This would be a repeat of another failed experiment.\u00a0When Congress passed legislation similar to the Sunshine Protection Act in 1973, implementing Daylight Saving Time year-round, it <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/smart-news\/what-happened-the-last-time-the-us-tried-to-make-daylight-saving-time-permanent-180979742\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">lasted<\/a> only 10 months before Congress <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov\/sites\/default\/files\/pdf_documents\/library\/document\/0055\/1668702.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">repealed<\/a> it \u2014 such was the public outcry.\u00a0Soon after that short-lived legislation was implemented, a Utah congressman named Gunn McKay <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newspapers.com\/article\/the-daily-herald-daylight-savings-repeal\/161039578\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">said<\/a> that \u201cinstituting it [Daylight Saving Time] on a year-around basis is an obvious mistake.\u00a0There have been needless accidents and fatalities in the mornings with children going to school in the dark.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Daylight Saving Time is actually a well-conceived idea that helps Americans enjoy summertime more fully.\u00a0It\u2019s a foolish idea to apply in the wintertime.\u00a0One hopes that the Senate sees this more clearly than the House did.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Jeffrey H. Anderson is president of the <a href=\"\/\/www.americanmainstreet.org\">American Main Street Initiative<\/a> and served as director of the Bureau of Justice Statistics at the U.S. Department of Justice from 2017 to 2021.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Congress pushes time change, ignoring its real priorities<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2106,"featured_media":2634030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/clock.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33651],"tags":[83069,83071,83070,83072],"class_list":["post-2634029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-western-journal","tag-clock-legislation","tag-congressional-policies","tag-daylight-saving","tag-time-change-debate"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/clock.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2634029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2634029"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2634029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2634033,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2634029\/revisions\/2634033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2634030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2634029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2634029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2634029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}