Why are the numbers, letters reversed on Tennessee’s In God We Trust license plates?

The newly redesigned blue and white Tennessee license plates are getting a lot attention. Some people have noticed the order of letters and numbers is different depending on whether drivers choose the In God We Trust version of the plate.

The standard plates use a letters first configuration — ABC 1234, for example — but the In God We Trust plates reverse the letters and numbers: 123 ABCD. But why?

It has to do with accommodating all of Tennessee’s drivers, according to the Tennessee Department

of Revenue.

“For administrative and inventory purposes, the ‘In God We Trust’ plate is issued as a unique plate class with a specific configuration format,” Tennessee Department of Revenue Director of Communications Kelly Cortesi told Knoxville News Sentinel. “This helps prevent duplicate issuance of sequences between the two different plate types.”

In other words, having the numbers and letters switched gives the state more unique combinations to use on individual plates.

The new blue plates became available Jan. 3 and raised concerns among drivers who speculated (or feared) the formats were designed to easily identify religious beliefs or political leanings.

But the sequencing is not new to Tennessee. It’s been that way since 2017.

The old green mountain-themed plates used the serial formats ABC 123 and 123 ABC to differentiate between the two styles.

Tennessee is not the only state that has differing serial formats for In God We Trust plates. Florida, Indiana, South Carolina and Utah do this or have done it in recent years.

The popularity of the In God We Trust plates varies from county to county.

About 54% of the new blue plates issued statewide between the start of the year and April 22 have featured “In God We Trust,” according to data from the state Department of Revenue.

Forty-five percent of Knox County drivers who have the new style of plates have opted for “In God We Trust,” while 55% did not.

Drivers in Fentress County this year have requested the highest percentage of In God We Trust plates with 98.1%, and Van Buren County is close behind with 97.7%.

Davidson County has the largest margin of drivers opting for the standard plates at 86.1%. Madison County is a distant second with 66.7% so far.