THE American trucking industry has never been one to give up something for nothing. Among the more powerful lobbies in Washington, it measures its concessions with a practiced eye and plies its considerable influence within the White House and Congress with canny ability. The industry doesn't always win, but it economizes its losses, minimizing any major defeats through a higher order of horse trading that generally leaves it, if not with a better bargain, at least with an equal one.

In December of last year, President Reagan ran a five-cent-a-gallon increase in the gas tax through a lame duck Congress anxious to melt out of Washington for the Christmas holidays. The tax, which was signed into law on January 6, is designed both to raise more than $5 billion a year to rebuild the nation's crumbling highways and bridges, and to aid mass transportation. Coupled with the rise in the tax on fuel are increases in taxes on truck parts, truck road use, and truck sales. From the point of view of the American Trucking Association (ATA)--the industry's major voice in Washington--it looked like a rather unpleasant bill of goods. Not being the kind of group to throw in the towel without a substantial show of muscle, the ATA conceded defeat only after wringing a very substantial concession from an overtired Congress.

The price of defeat, which may in the long run outweigh the benefit of the tax, was the final removal of what have long been thorns in the industry's side--the size and weight restrictions on the interstate highway system. In 1956, Congress limited combined tractor and trailer weights to 73.280 lbs, and widths to 96 inches. Given that the average interstate is designed for weights of 60,000 lbs., the limit erred on the side of generosity--generosity doubtless matching the largesse of the industry lobbyists.

The margin was still insufficient as far as the ATA was concerned, but the group had little success in producing further changes until another pre-Christmas legislative rush in 1974. At that time, once again making the very best of a bad situation, it traded the 55 mile per hour speed limit for an increase in weight to 80,000 lbs., an increase in width to 102 inches, and an extension of the length limit to 65 feet--allowing truckers to operate the longer tandem trailers. It was a healthy exchange, but unfortunately for the industry, 14 states with lower limits exercised the option of maintaining the prior restrictions. The ATA has had its eye on this last vestige of barely intelligent highway management for several years, and despite grievous protestation, it was only too glad to accept the Reagan Administration's offer to override these last recalcitrants and open all of the nation's interstate highways to equal abuse.

Anyone who has travelled the interstate system in the past few years cannot help but notice the increasingly sorry state of the road surface. The obvious culprits in this devastation are the trucks. Despite the stickers boasting of the 4,000 plus dollars they pay each year in road taxes, they have never paid, and barring some radical transformation, will probably never pay for the havoc they wreak on highways. At the present time, trucks over 75,000 lbs pay only 45 percent of the costs they incur, and the interstates are deteriorating at a rate 50 percent greater than anticipated due to huge increases in truck volume and weight. A study done by the Illinois Department of Transportation estimated that a 5 percent increase in gross and axle weights would produce damage by a single truck equivalent to that done by 10,000 passenger cars; the 1974 and 1983 legislation increased weights by 10 percent.

An even gloomier side to this already somber picture concerns safety. It is an unfortunate fact that as weight increases so does the accident fatality rate; everyone from the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) to the American Automobile Association agrees that the records of the high weight tandem trailers are particularly discouraging A DOT study done in 1982 demonstrated a disturbing 12.2 fatalities per million miles for tandems, considerably higher than the 5.6 per million miles for single trucks, and dwarfing the 2.96 per million rate for passenger cars. Despite these statistics, the ATA, which vigorously defends the safety record of heavy trucks, can probably remain relatively secure from attack until the results of a definitive DOT study are formulated in 1985.

IRONICALLY, when Reagan affixed his signature to the tax legislation on January 6, he may have given the trucking industry not only the benefits of increased weights, but also a backhanded gift in the form of the tax increases. Prior to the passage of the Motor Carrier Act of 1980, trucking was a heavily regulated industry. Only approved common carriers could handle goods other than unprocessed foodstuffs and raw materials, and the 100,000 independent truckers, who make up about one quarter of the industry were regularly forced to pay 25 to 50 percent of their receipts to "rents" certificates from licensed companies in order to avoid making empty and expensive trips.

With the onset of deregulation and broad entry, the process of "trip leasing" quickly evaporated, cutting off a large source of revenue for the major trucking firms and allowing the independent truckers full access to previously closed markets. Considered "gypsies," whose organization has been seen as a threat to the Teamsters and to the ATA, the independents have always been on the fringe of the trucking industry. The 1974 and 1979 strikes were viewed with a certain uneasiness by the trucking hierarchy, and despite the independent's occasional effectiveness, it's obvious that the established elements would be quite happy if they simply vanished.

Deregulation and recession have not been kind to the industry. The business of virtually every major firm has been hurt, and the common estimate is that a 20- to 30- percent excess capacity presently exists. These are hard times for truckers, and Reagan's advice concerning "passing on the tax to the customer" has a decidedly hollow ring in the face of the cutthroat competition engendered by the present situation. It is hardly a surprise that the independent truckers chose to strike or that the ATA and the Teamsters were less than effusive in supporting them. From the trucking establishment's point of view, it wouldn't be all that bad if the tax increases could squeeze the independents out of the picture.

Regardless of the face that Michael Parkhurst--the head of the Independent Truckers Association--would have liked to paint on the finish of the strike, the end result was a full scale rout for the independents. Dropping his predictions of 98 percent compliance to 70 percent during the first week of the strike, Parkhurst was eventually dealing with a 15 to 20 percent reduction in truck traffic--hardly the dent he had hoped for. The media concluded the affair by losing interest after the obligatory violence was curtailed, and the more fanatical independents and the lunatics who took advantage of the situation to delight in dropping bricks onto trucks from overpasses were checked (though not entirely stopped) by increased police protection.

The strike also gave Bennet Whitlock Jr.--the head of the ATA--the opportunity to stand piously on the sidelines praising the legislative approach to producing change and blaming Parkhurst for "the actions of a fewill-advised individuals who may adversely affect not only the vast majority of law abiding truckers but also the American public." Whitlock's concern for the populace is touching but also a tad hypocritical. It appears that in the long run, between increased deterioration of the interstate roadbeds, decreased safety, and increased shipping costs, the interests of the American people could have been far better served than they have been by the pillars of the trucking industry and the President.