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Busby v. State2/1/2002
ument in the next section of our opinion.
Returning to Busby's argument that the Convention bars a signatory country from withdrawing a person's right to use an international driving permit on its roads unless the person commits a new driving offense, this contention almost rebuts itself. This interpretation of the Convention defies common sense. Busby offers no reason to believe that the countries who signed the Convention intended to give each other the authority to forgive or erase existing driver's license revocations imposed by their fellow treaty states. In fact, the Convention on Road Traffic suggests precisely the opposite.
Article 5 of the Convention declares that it is "understood that ... all ... matters not provided for in this Convention remain within the competence of [each signatory state's] domestic legislation". No provision of the Convention expressly limits a signatory country's ability to enforce its pre-existing driver's license suspensions and revocations within its own territory. Moreover, AS 28.40.100(8) - part of the "domestic legislation" of Alaska - declares that the term "driver's license" means "[a person's] privilege to drive or obtain a license to drive ... whether or not person holds a valid license issued in this or another jurisdiction". (Emphasis added) Thus, under Alaska law, revocation of a person's driver's license ends that person's privilege to drive, regardless of any other driver's licenses that the person may possess or (as in Busby's case) may come to possess.
Additionally, we note that Article 24 of the Convention on Road Traffic appears to be premised on the idea that each signatory country is authorized to enforce its own driver's license suspensions and revocations within its own territory, even though the driver has an international driving permit and is authorized to drive in other signatory countries. Article 24, Section 5 empowers each signatory country to seize a person's international driving permit if that person has committed a traffic offense that entails the loss of their driving privileges. The second sentence of Section 5 states that the signatory country can seize and keep the international driving permit, but only until the person leaves that country's territory. Requiring the country to return the international driving permit to the departing driver makes sense only if one supposes that the permit remains in force within other signatory countries (at least until such time as those countries take action against the person's driving privilege). This, in turn, implies that each country remains free to enforce its own license suspensions and revocations.
In People v. Platts, 655 N.E.2d 300 (Ill. App. 1995), the Illinois Court of Appeals reached exactly this conclusion. Platts involved a driver whose Illinois license had been revoked. Platts moved to Canada, obtained a Canadian driver's license, and then returned to Illinois - where he was stopped for drunk driving and also charged with driving while his license was revoked. Platts argued that, under the provisions of the Convention on Road Traffic, " Illinois revocation was terminated when he was issued a Canadian driver's license". The Illinois court rejected this argument, interpreting the Convention as we have done here: Platts's Canadian license, while valid in Canada and perhaps other places, did not supersede the State of Illinois's pre-existing revocation of Platts's driving privileges within that state.
We hold that the Convention on Road Traffic does not preclude the State of Alaska from enforcing Busby's pre-existing license revocation. That revocation was a sufficient reason for the State of Alaska to deny Busby the right to use his
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