If you are driving 60 mph in the left lane, passing a car in the right lane that's doing 55 mph, in a 65 mph speed limit zone, you are doing nothing wrong, even if a car that's doing 65 or greater pulls up behind you. You have every right to complete your pass at your current speed without having to speed up.
Correct. And then you get over into the right lane to let the other guy pass.
Same thing if you were going 90 mph and the guy behind you were going 95 mph. Because KRETP laws don't exist in order to make it OK to impede some drivers but not other drivers.
While coming back to Wichita from Del Rio with my best friend, I was mildly irritated at his left lane behavior. He gets over into the left lane early, and he doesn't dip back into the right lane to let people by as long as there's someone within sight that he plans to pass as well. This behavior prompted a couple of drivers between OKC and Wichita to gun it around him in the right lane, and one even blared his horn at us.
When a driver with New Mexico plates gunned it around us in the right lane, my friend muttered "That's illegal in your state too".
— What's illegal? I asked
— Going around me in the right lane.
— I'm not aware of any state where that's illegal.
— It's illegal in Kansas.
— No it isn't. I've never seen that law. It is illegal to drive in the left lane when someone is wanting trying to get around you.
He slowly nodded his head and didn't say anything.
I don't know if he believed me or not.
I have heard this one a lot and I don't know where it comes from? Why do people think it's illegal to pass on the right?
I assume it's because states generally have laws prohibiting passing on the right
in certain circumstances—specifically on roads that have one lane per direction of traffic. Such laws vary by state and prohibit passing on the right unless there is sufficient room to do so, or unless doing so doesn't involve driving off the pavement, or whatever. Because such a law is a prohibition against "passing on the right", and only certain circumstances are listed as exceptions, people are simply taught that passing on the right is illegal. Some of them then assume it applies to multi-lane roads as well.
The first time I was ever pulled over, back when I was in high school, the police officer mentioned my having passed someone on the right (besides my speeding). It was a four-lane state highway, so perfectly legal, but apparently even the police officer was mistaken about the law (no longer surprising to me).