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We drivers are licensed. Vehicles are registered. Why are the plates called license plates?
Good question. Just like why is a driveway called a driveway and a parkway called a parkway? I know when I am on The Garden State Parkway I do more parking than driving
They're called license plates because when they first started being issued, there were no driver's licenses. The license plate on your car basically was your drivers license, you would take it with you when you parked the car so no one else could take it.
They're called license plates because when they first started being issued, there were no driver's licenses. The license plate on your car basically was your drivers license, you would take it with you when you parked the car so no one else could take it.
Kinda like the stereos in today's high tech cars (which have a handle on them for easy pullout and carry around).
I take mine out every time I leave my car for a minute or 2 which has a nice handle, and the ladies are eying me up.
They're called license plates because when they first started being issued, there were no driver's licenses. The license plate on your car basically was your drivers license, you would take it with you when you parked the car so no one else could take it.
In early days, cars were licensed, too. Starting around New York in 1901, it was required to buy a license in order to operate a motor vehicle. It still is, and calling it "registration" is just a euphemism for a revenue-generating licenseing operation that brings in about a billion dollars a year in revenue to the states.
If it were actually just a "registration", the fee would only be a few bucks to offset the cost of the state maintaining a registry, and once the vehicle was registered, it would not be necessary to pay fifty bucks year after year to keep doing it over again..
li·cense
noun
1. formal permission from a governmental or other constituted authority to do something,
Operating a motor vehicle on the public roads is not permitted until the government approves the particular vehicle. Thus, license. Registration would be nothing more than a list of all the vehicles that are being operated, with no restrictions on which vehicles are permitted.
Last edited by jtur88; 08-08-2013 at 08:08 PM..
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