Poll: Few New Jersey Residents Support Lower Drinking Age

A new poll shows few New Jersey residents support lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18.

A Fairleigh Dickinson-PublicMind poll shows just 18 percent of New Jerseyans surveyed would support lowering the age, while 76 percent favor leaving it as is.

The poll was taken in response to a letter signed by 129 college presidents who suggested lowering the drinking age as a way to deal with the campus binge drinking problem.

Highway Traffic Safety Director Pam Fischer is among those who worry lowering the age would increase driving fatalities and drunken driving cases.

The telephone poll of 1,064 New Jerseysans contacted from Sept. 4-8 has a sampling error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.