The Real ID Act started with a good intention: Standardize driver's licenses to prevent fraud.

Two years after it was passed by Congress, Real ID has seen a backlash from civil libertarians and state governments, which see it as a back-door attempt to create national identification papers and strip states of authority to determine who should drive.

The Real ID Act would require everyone to have a federally approved form of identification by May 11, 2008, to fly on a commercial flight, open a bank account, collect Social Security payments or obtain other government benefits. To obtain the federally approved driver's license, one would have to provide a photo ID along with proof of one's Social Security number, U.S. citizenship or legal residency, and the state would keep copies of those documents on file for several years.

The idea of a standardized identification was suggested in the 9/11 Commission's report as a way to prevent terrorists from obtaining identification papers needed to get on airplanes. Had such a rule been in place, the 9/11 hijackers may not have been able to move as freely as it would have prevented their getting driver's licenses to demonstrate legal residency.

In addition to standardizing identification, the act would require that state motor vehicle records databases be linked electronically to spot people attempting to get multiple licenses. It would also require that the cards be machine-readable, although the specifics (whether to use bar codes, magnetic strips or radio-frequency ID tags) has yet to be determined.

The government estimates it would cost $100 million to comply with the law, and has appropriated $40 million toward implementation to date.

But now a survey by the National Governors' Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures and the American Motor Vehicle Administrators concludes, after surveying 47 state licensing authorities, that implementation would actually cost $11 billion. The survey assumes that everyone will have to receive one of the new licenses within the next five years.

Fifteen states have taken legislative steps to oppose the measure. One of them, Montana, passed legislation prohibiting the state from implementing the measure.

In Utah, Rep. Glenn Donnelson, R-North Ogden, has sponsored a resolution calling on Congress to repeal the act in its entirety and let the states address problems of identification on their own. It does not say that Utah will refuse to comply, but the resolution, House Resolution 2, lays out a strong case for repeal.

Congress should revisit the issue. U.S. Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah, and Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, have expressed reservations about the act and want to revisit it.

The measure was passed as part of a 2005 defense appropriations bill, making it difficult for lawmakers to object. Real ID deserves, at the least, a reconsideration on its own merits for several reasons.

First, as legislative critics note, it imposes an underfunded mandate on states, forcing state governments to alter the way they handle driver's licenses. Traditionally, driver licensing has been strictly a state matter.

Overhauling the system to create machine-readable uniform identification may solve some security issues, but some states may not have the means to make those changes by 2008.

States may be better qualified than Congress to address certain national security concerns. For instance, Utah solved the problem of immigrants using a driver's license as proof of legal residency by creating a separate driver's privilege card for foreign nationals living here. The card merely shows that the holder is authorized to operate a motor vehicle in Utah, but it cannot be used for establishing one's status as a legal resident.

Real ID creates legitimate privacy concerns. If the cards use RFID technology to read them -- radio beams -- authorities could scan people from a distance and track their movements. Such surveillance capability gives us pause. Who would have access to the data on the card? A machine-readable card could be scanned by anyone who has the right equipment, from legitimate businesses to identity thieves. A cashier may want to verify the information on your check, but merchants could use data scanned from a machine-readable card to put you on a mailing list.

Unfortunately this has already happened. A night club in New Jersey recently got into trouble when it used a bar-code reader to obtain data from 15,000 people's driver's licenses. The club's owner told patrons that the cards were only scanned to spot fake IDs, but in reality the machine compiled all the names and addresses for marketing campaigns.

Congress should let the states find ways to create secure driver's licenses that neither bust state budgets nor violate civil liberties.