Yet More ID Card Legislation Being Passed

Liberty Think | January 31 2005

Not content with the national-ID regime put in to law in the so-called 9/11 intelligence reform bill, House Judiciary Chairman James Sensenbrenner has introduced a bill that would implement his own private Orwell.

The current bill sets up a "rulemaking" commission compromised of the Transportation Department, Homeland Security, state governors, and state departments of motor vehicles. The commission will draw up the rules for turning driver's licenses into de facto national ID cards over the next nine (now eight) months and finalize them in 18 (17) months.

Sensenbrenner would throw all that out and sets up some rules himself -- and give the Homeland Security Secretary the ability to unilaterally upgrade the "design" requirments. So, if the devilish Chertoff wakes up one morning and decides "national security" requires we all be fingerprinted and retina-scanned; that will be the new law.

Another part of the bill requires states to join the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators' (AAMVA) "Driver License Agreement," which integrates state drivers' licenses databases with those of Canada's and Mexico's, setting up a tri-national ID card.

Text from the bill and the DLA follows.

From HR 418:
A State shall participate in the interstate compact regarding sharing of driver license data, known as the `Driver License Agreement', in order to provide electronic access by a State to information contained in the motor vehicle databases of all other States.

[...]

The [Homeland Security] Secretary, in the Secretary's discretion--
(1) may, in addition to the requirements of subsection (b), prescribe one or more design formats for driver's licenses and identification cards that satisfy the requirements of this section in order--
(A) to protect the national security interests of the United States
And from the "Definitions" in the AAMVA Driver License Agreement:
Jurisdiction - A state, territory or possession of the United States, the District of Columbia, a territory or province of Canada or any state of the Republic of Mexico or the Federal District of Mexico.