The change to a shift lever was not a government mandate - the American government did not have the power to do that until 1966 when the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act was not enacted. Also enacted in 1966 was The Highway Safety Act and formation of the federal Department of Transportation. All that began American federal government mandates and laws. Prior to that the individual states had laws concerning vehicle equipment, such as headlamps, but the federal government had no power to do anything. Chrysler's buttons had the correct order, R-N-D-2-1, and Chrysler at the time stated it was due to sale resistance from Ford and GM owners that instigated the switch. After all, Dodge trucks and Corvairs had a lever on the dash for their automatics and Srudebaker kept its P-N-D-L-R quadrant until the very in 1966. If you check any articles written about the 1965 models, articles written during 1964-65 that is, you will find no reference to any government madates or standards. The switch was an industry decision, just as with the adoption of backup lights, exterior rear view mirrors and seat belts by 1966. All in an effort to prevent government intervention. And pushbuttons are used even today in trucks and buses. Bill Vancouver, BC ----- Original Message ----- From: John Harvey To: mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Tuesday, January 25, 2005 11:31 AM Subject: Re: IML: push button automatics I never saw anyone who had trouble with push button automatics. I heard rumors, but never actually knew anyone who had problems. This is from the day they were new, to where you could buy the car for $50 if it ran good, and the floor was still good enough that the seat didn't rock, to the collector cars they now are. I had 57 and 58 Mercurys, 58 Edsil, 56-64 Chrysler products with them, NEVER HAD PROBLEMS. With the Mercury and Edsils, that was about the only parts that were trouble free. Chrysler didn't stop using them because of problems, they stopped because the US Government mandated a standard automatic transmission selector starting 1955. GM had to redesign their transmissions to put the R between P and N, instead of all the way to the bottom where it had been from day one. JOhn ----------------- http://www.imperialclub.com ----------------- This message was sent to you by the Imperial Mailing List. Please reply to mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and your response will be shared with everyone. Private messages (and attachments) for the Administrators should be sent to webmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To UN-SUBSCRIBE, go to http://imperialclub.com/unsubscribe.htm