South Dakota Auxiliary Lighting: Three Driving Lamps at 12 to 24 Inches, and Nothing but Fog Lamps on Low Beam

SDCL 32-17-17 is written in two paragraphs with two different penalties, and that split matters. The first paragraph permits any motor vehicle to be equipped with up to three auxiliary driving lamps mounted on the front at a height not less than twelve inches nor more than twenty-four inches above the level surface upon which the vehicle stands, and requires every such lamp to meet the requirements and limitations of SDCL 32-17-1 to 32-17-16. A violation of that paragraph is a petty offense. The second paragraph provides that no auxiliary driving lamp other than a fog lamp may be lighted at any time the headlamps are on low beam, and a violation of that paragraph is a Class 2 misdemeanor. The mounting mistake is civil; switching them on in traffic is criminal.

The three-lamp count and the twelve-to-twenty-four-inch band are hard numbers, which puts a bumper-mounted pod bar in a very different position from a roof-mounted one. A roof bar sits far above twenty-four inches and therefore cannot be an auxiliary driving lamp within 32-17-17 at all. What reaches it instead is SDCL 32-17-20: any device other than headlamps, spot lamps, or auxiliary driving lamps that projects a beam of light of an intensity greater than twenty-five candle power shall be so directed that no part of the beam will strike the level of the surface on which the vehicle stands at a distance of more than fifty feet from the vehicle. In plain terms, an over-height light bar in South Dakota has to be aimed down into the first fifty feet of road, and lighting it as a distance light is a Class 2 misdemeanor.

Spot lamps are separate and capped at one. SDCL 32-17-19 allows a motor vehicle not more than one spot lamp, and requires every lighted spot lamp to be aimed and used when approaching another vehicle so that no part of the high intensity portion of the beam is directed to the left of the prolongation of the extreme left side of the vehicle, nor more than one hundred feet ahead of the vehicle. That is a Class 2 misdemeanor, and it is the section that reaches a pillar-mounted hunting light.

Color is where South Dakota is most restrictive, and it works by reserving colors to named classes rather than by a general ban. SDCL 32-17-9 makes it a Class 2 misdemeanor to drive or move any vehicle on a highway with any red light on it visible from directly in front, with the sole exception of an authorized emergency vehicle as defined by SDCL 32-14-1. Blue is controlled by SDCL 32-17-42, which permits blue lights only on vehicles authorized by the Department of Transportation, on a tow truck or wrecker as defined in SDCL 32-17-10, or on a vehicle operated by a fire department or search and rescue member or a qualifying ambulance operator, and only when actually en route to an emergency or performing winter highway maintenance, with written authorization from a named official. Green is narrower still: SDCL 32-17-44 allows one green rotating beacon visible 360 degrees on a vehicle used as a command post at an accident or emergency incident, and nowhere else. SDCL 32-17-45 confirms that the red and blue combination belongs to law enforcement.

Amber is South Dakota's utility color and it is also allocated rather than open. A tow truck or wrecker may run amber rotary or flashing lights, but only while actually engaging, towing, hauling or pushing a disabled vehicle or when a law enforcement officer orders it for safety, under SDCL 32-17-10. A United States mail vehicle may run a white-to-amber beacon only while actually carrying mail, under SDCL 32-17-22. A vehicle displaying a special handicapped license plate may carry not more than two amber flashing lights without glare, one front and one rear, mounted within three inches of each plate, and may use them only when the vehicle is stopped and the owner-operator needs assistance, under SDCL 32-17-23. SDCL 32-17-46 requires a flashing or rotating white or amber warning light on a slow-moving-vehicle-emblem vehicle operated between half an hour after sunset and half an hour before sunrise.

Underglow, rock lights and grille strobes have no section of their own. That is a real answer rather than a gap: because they are not headlamps, spot lamps or auxiliary driving lamps, they land in SDCL 32-17-20's twenty-five candle power and fifty-foot rule, and if any of them shows red to the front they are separately caught by SDCL 32-17-9. Finally, SDCL 32-17-5 forbids headlamps that project a glaring or dazzling light to persons in front of them and requires a lighted high beam indicator, so an aftermarket headlamp conversion is judged on glare rather than on bulb technology.

The penalties inside chapter 32-17 are deliberately uneven. Mounting three auxiliary driving lamps outside the twelve-to-twenty-four-inch band is a petty offense under the first paragraph of SDCL 32-17-17, which SDCL 22-6-7 makes a civil action in which the state is the plaintiff and SDCL 23-1A-22 caps at a twenty-five dollar judgment. Lighting a non-fog auxiliary lamp on low beam is a Class 2 misdemeanor under the second paragraph, and SDCL 22-6-2 sets that at up to thirty days in a county jail or a five hundred dollar fine, or both.

The same Class 2 exposure attaches to a misaimed spot lamp under SDCL 32-17-19, to an over-intensity device aimed beyond fifty feet under SDCL 32-17-20, to a red light showing to the front under SDCL 32-17-9, and to unauthorized blue lights under SDCL 32-17-42. Enforcement sits with the Division of Highway Patrol and local agencies, and SDCL 32-33-1 lets a court impound a vehicle that does not conform to the lighting provisions of the title until it is made to conform, which is a real remedy for a persistently non-compliant light bar rather than a theoretical one.