This whole thing is driven by government employees who want to get in a full round of gold before sunset. Foolish all the way around. DST saves nothing. It reminds me of Sheila Jackson-Lee's view on Gitmo.
Those of you might remember DST came about during the Nixon Admistration passed by Demo congress. Real bi-partisan
That's a bit "wide of the mark" (political commentary aside).
On March 19, 1918 the U.S. Congress established several time zones (which were already in use by railroads and most cities since 1883) and made daylight saving time official (which went into effect on March 31) for the remainder of World War I. It was observed for seven months in 1918 and 1919. The law, however, proved so unpopular (mostly because people rose earlier and went to bed earlier than in modern times) that the law was later repealed.
Daylight saving time was reinstated in the United States on February 9, 1942, again as a wartime measure to conserve resources, this time in order to fight World War II. This remained in effect until the war began winding down and the requirement was removed on September 30, 1945.
From 1945 to 1966, there was no federal law about daylight saving time. States and localities were free to observe daylight saving time or not. This resulted in a patchwork where some areas observed DST and adjacent areas did not, and it was not unheard of to have to reset one's clock several times during a relatively short trip (e.g., bus drivers operating between Moundsville, West Virginia, and Steubenville, Ohio had to reset their watches seven times over 35 miles).
The Uniform Time Act of 1966 mandated that daylight saving time begin nationwide on the last Sunday of April and end on the last Sunday of October. Any state that wanted to be exempt from daylight saving time could do so by passing a state law, provided that it exempt the entire state. The law was amended in 1972 to permit states that straddle a time zone boundary to exempt the entire area of the state lying in one time zone. The law was amended again in 1986 to begin daylight saving time on the first Sunday in April, to take effect the following year.
In response to the 1973 energy crisis, daylight saving was begun earlier in both 1974 and 1975, commencing on the first Sunday in January in the former year and the last Sunday in February in the latter. According to a report from CNN, the U.S. Congress may again pass a bill extending daylight saving time by two months, beginning on the first Sunday in March and ending on the last Sunday in November. The purpose of this bill is to address increasing energy usage, allowing the nation to conserve more energy than it would otherwise.
