Besides high unemployment, declining wages and a constantly increasing cost of living, Americans now face another menace that could send them directly to bankruptcy court.
According to Yahoo News, the five most egregious states for issuing insanely high speeding tickets are Georgia, Illinois, North Carolina, Nevada and New Hampshire.
These five states all hold drivers liable for a fine of up to $1,000 for a first offense. The fine is up to a judge’s discretion and can be based on how many miles per hour you’re ticketed over the designated speed limit, or if you were caught speeding in a work or a school zone, both of which tend to double a fine. In addition to the fine, you can spend up to a year in jail. Granted, speeding in a work zone is bad for everyone concerned, but a few moments of inattention resulting in a $1,000 fine? What’s the first offense for a weapons violation in those states?
Besides issuing tickets that can only be described as confiscatory in nature, other states employ the reprehensible practice of issuing speeding tickets as a means of raising revenue and actually pay police bonuses based on the number of tickets written. When enforcing speeding laws becomes an oppressive operation to raise revenue instead of a means to increase public safety, a predictable outcome is low public opinion of both elected officials and police officers.
Making a further mockery of citizen rights, states like Massachusetts charge prohibitive fees to appeal a traffic enforcement ticket.
Back in 2005, Vincent Gillespie got a $15 parking ticket in Northampton, Massachusetts, a bucolic community in the Connecticut River Valley in Central Massachusetts. In order to fight the ticket, Gillespie had to pay $319.90 in filing fees with the Hampshire County Superior Court, which was non-refundable whether he won his case or not.
Needless to say, when Gillespie took his case to the Massachusetts “Supreme Court”, the judge decided in favor of the state, thereby cementing the lack of a citizen’s right to due process.
While the courts, police and elected officials can laugh off citizen protests about consistory fines and unjust traffic enforcement, a $1,000 ticket is enough to send one out of four Americans to the bankruptcy court. According to recent statistics from the Federal Reserve, 25% of Americans have absolutely no savings at all and the average American family has only $3,800 in savings. It is nothing less than an outrage to issue $1,000 tickets for driving 5 miles over the speed limit. Wasn’t it these types of oppressive behavior by government that lead to the American revolution to free ourselves form the tyranny of Great Britain?
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