Evening star., 1947-08-16
accompli S h.

ment, uor tIlat Dy SaCrlnclng an nOur or so
once every six years in the interests of greater
safety in traffic, little purpose would be served
except to harass thousands of local citizens
| unnecessarily"
Although there Is a growing trend over the
country toward periodic re-examination of all
drivers and the same is already in effect in the
State of California, I realize that no motor
vehicle administrator will win any popularity
for himself by suggesting such action. For the
average -motorist, once he receives a drivers
permit, wants to continue to drive with mini
mum Of official interference. In the District
Of Columbia we have permitted him to do just
that In fact, the triannual permit renewal
has been resolved into little more than
| revenue-raising device.
Yet it seems to me that where the licensing
of even one incompetent driver poses serious
threat to life and property, the matter Of peri
odic examination makes lot of sense. There
are thousands of permit holders in the District
who either never took an examination at all
df they obtained their permits before road
tests were required) or, If they took an exam
nation. will hardly remember of what it
consisted
motorcycle officer told me the other day
that Of the last 20 persons he had arrested for
speeding, 10 of them did not know the speed
does not know the legal limit? Furthermore,
there is hardly week passes that my Office
does not receive letters and phone calls from
persons-frequently relatives-strongly urging
that we re-examine q particular individual
known by them to have certain dangerous
shortcomings, before we renew his permit The
law provides that upon the renewal of any
| such operators permit such examination and
demonstration may be waived in the discretion
of the Commissioners or their designated
agent"
Under an act of Congress- it is required that
all automobiles registered in the District be
inspected annually. Through this inspec-
ton, the testing stations are frequently able
to uncover one or more dangerous conditions
of which the car owner was not aware. Motor
sts have been extremely grateful for this service.
Might not this also happen in a periodic re-
examination of the driver-with salutary ef-
feet on traffic accident reduction?
1t is true that nearly one-half of the drivers
on District streets on any day are other than
District residents However, would Mr..
Edwards advocate the junking of our inspec-
ton system because some of our visitors come
from neighboring states which do not have
such systems? Would he favor doing away with
even the original examination of drivers be-
cause some OF our visitors come from States
which do not yet require one, or, because the
examination in some other States does not re-
quire road test would he do away with that,
too?
Mr.. Edwards suggests a system of traffic
spotters-special traffic police cruising around
in unmarked cars so that they could apprehend
a vast number of violators can think of no
greater campaign Of harassment than one in
volving a squad of special plain clothes police
pouncing down on unsuspecting motorists who
have already committed an infraction of the
traffic regulations. Is the objective of the
traffic police to build up a record number OF
arrests after dangerous violations of the traffic
regulations have occurred or isn't their principal
objective to prevent accidents?
Surely, there can be no more effective de-
terrent to bad driving on District streets than
the uniformed police officer riding in an official
vehicle clearly identified as such. "Snooping"
in traffic by police or by citizens has always
been unpopular, and wherever it has been
tried, it has always resulted in q great wave
Of public Indignation
I realize full well that there is no examina-
ton or re-examination which will produce
state of driver Utopia. We always will have
with us those who are reckless and those who
are careless repeat, however, that where the
licensing of even one incompetent poses q
serious threat to safety, the small inconvenience
which would be caused by simple re-examina-
ton Of drivers once every six years would be
we'll justified by the results which I am sure
would follow GEORGE E. KENEIPP,
Director of Vehicles and Traffic.