New Hampshire was the first state to reject federal Real ID driver's license rules that will create a high-tech version of a national identification card.

To emphasize our opposition, Gov. John Lynch signed a law prohibiting New Hampshire from participating in the system.

Now the state, led on this issue by Lynch and U.S. Sen. John Sununu, should stand fast against federal authorities, who say that starting in May residents of New Hampshire and three other states will be turned away from airports and federal buildings or subjected to enhanced security measures unless the state adopts the new driver's licenses.

Airport security checks, even post-9-11, generally involve minimal delays. That will change on the day the new law goes into effect. Travelers who show up without a Real ID or a passport will be funneled to secondary screeners and clog the system. Some of the people forced to travel with a passport will no doubt lose them, thus decreasing rather than increasing national security.

The entire Real ID program should be put on hold until Congress has the opportunity to fully debate the law, its costs and its implications for national security and citizen privacy. No, "show us your papers" law that fundamentally changes America's way of life and freedom to travel should have been passed without debate as an addendum to a spending bill. But that's what Republicans did in 2005 with the Real ID Act. The law tramples on the rights of states and inflicts an exorbitant and unnecessary burden on them.

The new regulations require states to issue driver's licenses with magnetic strips that contain a wealth of personal information about drivers and links to copies of birth certificates and other documents used to prove identity. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff claims the system is both necessary to fight the war on terrorism and secure. It's neither.

The new ID cards may be almost impossible to counterfeit, but that's not true of the documents used to establish an identity and get a Real ID. Birth certificates can be faked, as can passports and other documents. Harried clerks who issue and renew driver's licenses may not catch the forgeries.

Corrupt officials could be bribed to accept bogus documents, and greedy people with access to the information would be tempted to sell it. Inevitably, some of the private information would be posted on the internet by mistake or contained in a laptop that's lost or stolen.

Chertoff claims that the wealth of personal information on the new IDs will be safe from hackers, identity thieves, political enemies and curious or malicious employees. Tell that to the three presidential candidates whose passport files were illegally accessed by supposedly curious federal workers.

Tell that to the millions of people who shopped at T J Maxx, Marshalls and Hannaford whose credit card information may have been hijacked. Some have been the victim of identity theft, and all must routinely monitor their accounts for signs of illegal activity to protect themselves.

Sununu has joined a handful of other senators to ask Chertoff to exempt all 50 states from the May deadline. Chertoff should do so. That would give Congress time to reform the bill in a way that makes licenses more secure without compromising the privacy of citizens in the name of fear.