50 Years Ago

Sunday, Feb. 18, 1973

Company is coming to feast on a prime roast, and you dash down to the corner butcher shop only to realize your cash is low. No panic. You whip out the trusty checkbook and the roast is yours.

Almost every day, drugstores, supermarkets, department stores and merchants of all kinds accept your check.

Checks in lieu of cash have become such a burden that banks are searching for other methods of exchange, credit cards being the main alternative. Drop by an operations office and a bank to observe the continuous flow of personal checks. Chances are you will not see a single dime unless an employee is on his way to the coffee machine.

But try paying your driver’s license fee with a check. The Department of Public Safety says it will not accept your signature.

The directive has recently reinforced the longstanding policy of not accepting personal checks for payment of fees. Driver’s license examiners cannot use state funds to cash checks, meaning their use to pay fees, the director says.

A spokesman at the Rome State Patrol barracks said the reason for the no check policy is that it is too much of a hassle with bookkeeping when a check bounces.

To avoid the problem, they demand currency.

But what about the poor guy who hasn’t a chance to cash a check in his haste to get to the barracks on the day his license expires?

“We have an out,” answered the spokesman. “Most people run over … (to a nearby department store) and get their checks cashed.”

The next question is, what kind of individual is going to give the State Patrol, of all government agencies, a bad check?

Spokesman laughed. “What yo-yo is going to come in drunk to take a driver’s license exam? We get a drunk in here about once a week or so. People will do anything, including giving us a bad check.”