N.Y. clerks protecting our borders
PUBLISHED: Friday, October 26, 2007

True confession: I’ve never followed local politics closely enough. I’ve always been drawn more to the interplay of nations than of neighbors.
But now, with illegal immigration out of control and our border a shambles — the very baseline of the interplay of nations — it is our neighbors, our local representatives, who are increasingly taking charge of this crucial chunk of national policy.

City Hall, the local planning commission and the county clerk’s office are where the action is.

And, not coincidentally, where the grown-ups are.

Take Frank Merola, county clerk of Rensselaer County in New York.

When New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer recently ordered up driver’s licenses for illegal aliens, County Clerk Merola said no.

Merola refused to issue licenses to illegal aliens.

He has since been joined by 12 other New York county clerks.

They’ve all refused to issue such licenses because doing so compromises the security of the document — and, therefore, the security of the country. (You’d think a governor could figure this out.)

Their other reason is issuing such licenses breaks several New York state and federal laws. (Again, not rocket science.)

These laws include The Real I.D. Act of 2005, passed by Congress and signed by President Bush, which requires anyone seeking a driver’s license to have a valid (i.e., not phony) Social Security number.

Are these good citizens contemplating acts of civil disobedience?

Quite the contrary.

By refusing to license illegal aliens, they are, in fact, upholding the laws of the land — laws the governor himself is prepared to flout.

Far from subverting the state’s integrity, the county clerks actually are trying to protect it against the governor’s irresponsible efforts to throw it away.

In a post-grown-up world, they are trying to restore what you might call an adult sense of order.

Meanwhile, Spitzer — a governor, who, in the words of CNN’s Lou Dobbs, “requires training wheelsâ€