SB 63, arguably my favorite bill in the Utah Legislature at the moment (admittedly for trivial and selfish reasons), failed to make it out of committee today. The bill, introduced by Dan Eastman, would have removed the requirement for a front license plate on vehicles in Utah - the argument being that the front plate is unnecessary and causes cosmetic damage to cars. The change also would have saved the state about $1 million per year.

My support for the bill is due to the fact that I own a European car, and the front-end is designed to accommodate a European-style plate. I was told by the DMV that I could put a Euro-style plate on it along with a normal plate, which would look exponentially uglier. Other Audi and BMW owners in Utah seem to have ignored this and have thrown the Euro-style novelty plates on the front in lieu of regular Utah plates.

My silly reasons for supporting this bill aside, I think it is an interesting example of when laws should be repealed. Eastman claimed that roughly 30% of Utahns ignore the front plate rule anyway, and when such a significant portion of the population ignores a law, the chances are good that it is bad policy and should be repealed unless there are very compelling reasons to keep it. In this case, I don’t see any compelling reasons to keep it around.