YOU guys…that’s much better/worse than I expected when I contributed that remark.
Anyone live in Kentucky? Does it cost anything to apply for a personalized plate? Might be fun to put some of these to the test.
Can’t imagine they haven’t been applied for already? It IS Kentucky…
You can still get a personalized plate:
KY JELY
Kentucky Jelly is great on toast.
As an ACLU supporter, I’m always happy when I read about them spending my donation on a cause like this.
ETA: I wonder if Trinidad/Tobego would allow a plate I’M GRUDE.
\According to the Psalmist in 81st in RC version and 82 in KJV version the psalmist says " I said you are gods and sons of the most high", Jesus uses this in John 10 to validate his calling God his father
I bet liberals and conservatives would reverse their beliefs if they swap whichever reason they hold is fact.
1/ He is a bold atheist cocking a snook at religion.
2/ He is a religious nut who is sure of his own Godhood, only creator of Heaven and Earth and the Firmaments in between.
American Nuthood has historical evidences of both.
Eh, I am pretty much in agreement with the OP. I don’t believe in god, but I think for the state to allow a plate they know some will find offensive is to participate in what is likely to happen (road rage, vadalism, etc). His right to free speech is not infringed. And the state doesn’t have an obligation to provide the platform for his speech. So I am supportive of vanity plates erring on the safe side.
I have a bigger issue with them putting “In God We Trust” on the license plate as that’s forcing residents to carry around a religious message. Not sure how that’s OK
I’m amazed that no one has actually given the legally correct answer. All of the lawyers must be at home litigating the case of Family v. Turkey. I’m an uninformed armature, but I guess it’s up to me to do my best.
While you are narrowly correct that no one has an absolute right to express themself with government property, we each have a very strong right under the free speech and religious freedom clauses of the 1st Amendment (and also the equal protection clause of the 14th) to have the SAME OPPORTUNITY to express ourselves (especially religiously) that the government chooses to give to any other citizen. It is absolutely forbidden for the government to favor one type of religious message over another.
What this means, is that once a state allows its license plates to become a forum for citizens to express themselves, it must treat all such expressions impartially. This doesn’t necessarily mean that it can have no restrictions or regulations regarding what can be put on a license plate. Limitations on length are obviously ok, for example, and it is almost certainly acceptable to prohibit obscenity (but good luck defining it). But it absolutely cannot discriminate between different religious beliefs (or between different classes of people granted protection under the 14th).
This means the easiest solutions for the state are to allow either any message whatsoever (there being no constitutional requirement to protect people from obscene or shocking language, even if they are permitted to), or to simply disallow any personal message whatsoever from license plates. (As you noted, there is no right to express yourself on a license plate absent someone else being allowed to do so.)
Arguably, the state could allow personal messages on license plates while prohibiting, say, ALL mentions of religion, since this would not discriminate against any particular belief, but it would open itself to charges of discrimination against religion by allowing competing secular messages but not equivalent non-secular ones. (Why is “ILVMONEY” acceptable but “ILVGOD” not?)
This is exactly parallel to the case of monuments on the courthouse lawn. Once you allow a Ten Commnadments monument to go up, you pretty much have no choice but to allow a Satanist monument.
BTW, I strongly disagree with your categorization of Mr. Hart’s message as “demeaning other residents’ religious views.” The idea that stating ones own viewpoint directly is demeaning to people of different viewpoints is pernicious. “CHRISTISKING” does not demean nonchristians. “NO GOD” does not demean theists. And “IM GOD” does not demean non-self-worshippers. That idea is not only silly, but erodes the social discourse.
Or 3/ He’s a nutcase whose views are so fractured and crazy that it’s impossible to describe them in sane terms.
Frankly, I have no idea which of these three it is, but I also don’t think it matters. The state let him choose what his license plate would say, and he chose.
Well, if he gets it - I am going to immediately look to get
‘NO I AM’
A few years ago somebody in IIRC California had the plate “GOT MILF”. IMO a great multi-entendre play on the then-popular “Got milk?” advertising slogan.
Somebody eventually complained about the plate and the State tried to rescind it. Which they first do by asking the plate owner what the words mean. Apparently situations such as the wording being your initials or your company or something is a statutory exception to the State’s statutory general right of at-will license plate censorship.
Anyhow, the guy wrote back that “MILF” was the initialism of some club he operated. Which story they bought for a couple months until somebody with more brains at the DMV HQ clued them in to the common slang for hot upper-20s women.
At which point they pulled his plate for lying to them on the form about his “club”.
I thought we had a thread on topic, but I couldn’t find it.
I think you meant an unformed armature.
Uniformed armature detective.
So why doesn’t he smiteth them for not issuing the plateth?
They are already sentenced to the DMV, what more hell could be rained upon them?
I think provoking confrontations is the real issue. Some Christian (and it will be a Christian, it will not be an Orthodox Jew, or a fundamentalist Muslim, however offended they may feel internally) is either going to forcefully rear-end this guy with his truck, or get out at a stoplight and ask him with a tire iron exactly what he means. Hilarity will NOT ensue, although blood might.
So I can see that this might be sort of like shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theater, when there is no fire.
Ideally, no one would get so upset by this plate, but honestly, if people aren’t going to be upset by it, do you think the guy would still want it? He wants to be provocative, and the state is saying “No, you can’t be.”
When I was 25, I would probably have been all up in arms about the guy’s civil rights, but I’m almost 50, and I just want to tell him that there are better things to do with his time. And better ways to get a concussion.
If for some reason I had to drive around with “in god we trust” on my license plate, I’d ask for one that said “noidont” or “thehellido”.
I likewise don’t accept the right to be a dick as the point of freedom of speech, let alone freedom of religion. It’s the same reason I do not support those trolling displays by Satanists. I think there is a bright enough line to draw here.
There is just no way the right to be a dick furthers anything. Yes, you might be perceived as a dick in pursuit of a cause. But then the cause is what is important, and makes that freedom of speech.
But when you do things just to provoke, all you do is make the world objectively worse. There’s just no good policy reason for allowing it.