Maine Rejects Real ID

January 26th, 2007 tristan Posted in ID cards, US, maine, politech 1 Comment »

I see that the Commonwealth of Maine has overwhelmingly rejected the Real ID Act which seeks to impose a Federal ID Card through drivers licenses. Both houses of the state legislature have approved a resolution stating that the state will refuse to force its citizens to use driver’s licenses which comply with the Real ID Act.

I wish all the anti ID card campaigners luck in the US, and hope more states follow suit.

This is an interesting battle from a constitutional point of view as well, the Act (which was tacked onto a Tsunami Relief bill) represents another power grab by the federal government. Driver’s licenses are issued by the states and are wholly a matter for the individual states, by seeking to tack on a federal ID Card to the licenses the federal government is taking more power, undermining the foundation of the Constitution even more.

Videos of some of the speeches are available here.

(links via Politech which has also had some very good coverage of issues like voting machines and free speech on the Internet).

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