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May 03, 2005
Jumping Through Hoops for Drivers' Licenses
Congress is moving quickly toward setting strict rules on how states issue driver's licenses, requiring them to verify whether each applicant for a new license or a renewal is in this country legally.
This means that all 50 states would have to follow the same procedure for granting drivers' licenses: proof of citizenship or legal residence, proof of a Social Security number, checking the status of legal non-citizens in a national database, and saving not only documents given for proof, but a photo of that person in the database. Another nice feature is that the licenses of legal long-term residents would expire at the same time as their visas.
Of course, the whiners out there are screaming about "invasion of privacy" and "national ID card" and "database vulnerable to identity theft." Don't we already have that with Social Security? Fake Social Security numbers have been a huge problem for years, and as for a national ID card, don't most businesses ask for your SS number when applying for credit, buying a house, etcetera? None of these things were "supposed" to happen with everyone's favorite social program, but they did.
If national security will be tightened as a result of this upcoming legislation, I am all for it. And, if hampering illegal immigration is a side effect, all the better. (Notice I said illegal immigration. I don't want to discourage people from coming here, but I do expect them to follow our laws when doing so. Other countries have immigration laws that they uphold...why should we be the exception?)
After all, if stricter rules had been in place, perhaps the 9/11 hijackers would not have had the ability to get as far as they did. Hindsight, of course, is 20/20...we'll never know for sure. We can't change what happened, but we can do our best to ensure that nothing like that happens again.
Posted by at May 3, 2005 12:53 PM
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Comments
One problem with expiring DLs with visas is for students; their DLs with have to be renewed every semester at high expense to them and the state.
The problem isn't that Driver's licenses are easy to get, the problem is that they are too widely accepted by people for id. We shouldn't punish people who will pay up to $100 for their licenses, we should make sure the government requires better id for services.
Posted by: paul at May 3, 2005 11:33 PM
You make an interesting point!
Posted by: Pam M. at May 4, 2005 11:11 AM