COLUMBIA--A Senate bill that would reduce the legal limit for a driver's blood-alcohol level doesn't go far enough to combat drunken driving, critics of the legislation say.

The bill reduces to 0.08 percent from 0.10 percent the blood-alcohol level at which a driver is presumed drunk. But a provision requiring the state to revoke a suspected drunken driver's license immediately was not included in the bill that the Senate began debating Thursday.

Sen. Larry Martin, R-Pickens, said he had to compromise on the license revocation to get senators to agree to a lower blood-alcohol limit. "I would never get this bill through the Senate if the Administrative License Revocation stays in," Martin said.

Currently, licenses are immediately revoked for 30 days for drivers whose blood-alcohol level is 0.15 percent. But that provision would be eliminated by the Senate's bill.

Martin said the federal government is requiring states to reduce the allowable blood-alcohol level to 0.08 percent. Also, states that revoke licenses of suspected drunken drivers immediately, must lower the standard for that to 0.08 percent.

However, Martin said there was no way his colleagues would lower the limit for revoking licenses, so his version of the bill eliminates that provision altogether.

The federal government is pushing the lower level by threatening to take away $60 million in highway funds from South Carolina. The state already has lost $1.8 million in incentives by not going along with new federal drunken driving standards.

Donna Carter, incoming president of the Darlington County chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said the Senate bill is unacceptable. "It's a watered down bill that MADD doesn't want," she said.

The Administrative License Revocation is a valuable deterrent to drunken driving, said Harold Watson, director of programs and development for the National Commission Against Drunk Driving.

Forty states have provisions that immediately revoke licenses of drivers who have a blood-alcohol level of 0.08 percent or 0.10 percent.

Alcohol-related traffic fatalities in those states have decreased as much as 9 percent, Watson said.

The lower blood-alcohol limit is more effective when coupled with the automatic license revocation, said Betsy Lewis, executive director of the MADD South Carolina branch.

"Is the Senate bill what I want? No," she said. "Is it something? Yes. But I hope it's not what we end up with."

Lewis supports a stronger version of the bill, which includes license revocation, that is being considered in the House.

Martin said he's pleased to get the legislation in the Senate, where the bill has many opponents. Several senators have criticized the federal stance on withholding highway money from states that don't meet the new standards.

Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell said the federal government should pass its own drunken-driving law rather than forcing states to do it.

Martin said he also thinks the federal government is being "heavy-handed" but supports the lower blood-alcohol limit.