(FORTUNE Magazine) – When the speed limit went down to 55 mph across the U.S., traffic fatalities went down also. Then last year Congress permitted states to raise the limit to 65 on rural interstate highways, and 41 states did so. Now Transportation Secretary Jim Burnley, a proponent of higher speed limits, is trumpeting the news that ''there are no discernible differences ((in death rates)) between those rural interstates where the speed limit is still 55 and those where it's 65.'' Unfortunately, the best his Department of Transportation could do to back him up was an interim report issued three days later saying that the new limit had not been in effect long enough ''to determine its long-term impact on safety.'' Clearly it's a question of whose wheel you sit behind. Judith Stone, federal affairs director for the National Safety Council, opposes the new speed limit. Stone, who lives in D.C. and takes the subway to work, drives her used 1984 silver-gray Toyota Tercel mostly on weekends. ''Even if the speed limit is 65, I don't feel comfortable going over 60,'' she says. Burnley says he holds his white 1987 Mustang convertible -- the kind with the bumper skirts -- to the speed limit in 55 mph states. But he says that he felt like a major hazard when driving his son around Boston at that posted speed; everyone else was doing 75. The Transportation Department study is due in September 1989. Unfortunately, DOT won't get there any faster by looking into the speed limits in other countries and accompanying fatality rates. As the table on page 11 shows, there's little obvious correlation.

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE CREDIT: NO CREDIT CAPTION: NO CAPTION DESCRIPTION: Speed limit on super-highways and highway deaths for 1985 in West Germany, Italy, France, Britain, Canada, Japan, United States.