The board of the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles did something right this week when they rejected a proposed specialty license plate that would’ve featured a confederate flag:

But listed at the very end of this article in the Austin American-Statesman is a paragraph about another proposed license plate going up for a vote next month:

Next up for the board in December will be a vote on a proposed plate showing the three Christian crosses at Calvary, with the words “One State Under God,” proposed by a Nacogdoches church to raise money for its ministry projects.

So they’re going to vote on a plate that would look something like this… looks like this:

… with proceeds going to benefit Christian proselytizing.

State governments should never be the fundraising arms of local churches. It’s one thing for an optional license plate to benefit museums, non-profit groups, or veterans affairs… but to take sides on which religious groups it wants to support? The DMV would be setting itself up for a lawsuit as soon as a Mosque or atheist group or Jewish group filed for a license plate and got rejected. (Then again, maybe they’d learned their lesson if that happened.)

Right now, the state sells specialty plates reading “God Bless Texas” and “God Bless America.” But in both cases, 80% of the proceeds go back to the Texas Education Agency.

The vote’s not for another month, but you can let the DMV board know what you think about the upcoming proposal.

(Thanks to Keith for the link!)



