Crisis Averted!
February 28th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
You may remember that a while back newspapers across the state bemoaned, often on A1, the beginning of the end of the license plate frame. Yes, that innocent piece of plastic, favorite of car dealerships and churches alike, was in dire peril thanks to a poorly written law that, unintentionally, made it a crime “if that frame obscures even the tiniest bit of the doo-dad design details of the standard-issue Texas license plate,” as one judge wrote.
Luckily, the Senate committee on Transportation and Homeland Security stepped in this morning, quickly passing out of committee a bill that gets back to the original intent of the law: to forbid any coverings that obscure the actual license plate. Whew, that was close.
All kidding aside, Republican Tommy Williams, who’s carrying the bill, reminded the committee of the serious side effects of the sloppy statute: “In a concurring opinion, Judge Cochran called the law ‘uncommonly bad’ and said that it is a ‘gotcha law’ because it allows police to arbitrarily stop, ticket, arrest, and search anyone who is in violation. Pretty strong language from a court of criminal appeals justice.” Yeah, I’d say so.
