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Make ’em show ID

From the time most Marines turned 16 — in some states, 15 — they’ve carried picture identification.

It’s a requirement for driving a car or motorcycle. It’s also just an all-around good idea, a dog tag for the civilian world.

The Corps is in favor of picture ID as well, requiring every Marine to carry their military identification card in their left-breast pocket. Those ID cards, also required for any Marine hoping to log into a government computer or access the base during tightened security, include photo, rank and birthday.

Unless you are out of uniform, you have it with you.

Yet the Corps is preparing to roll back a rule requiring officers and staff noncommissioned officers in uniform to provide identification at base stores for age-controlled purchases, such as alcohol and tobacco. Officials from the Personal and Family Readiness Division, which oversees the regulations across the Corps, said some base officials considered the practice “a customer inconvenience and unnecessary.”

Perhaps that’s so. Perhaps reaching into your pocket and retrieving the card you are supposed to carry at all times, which has your photo and birthday on it, is too much hassle. Or, perhaps, many Marines find themselves standing in line without the card, having left it stuck in their office computer. (Yes, that’s a security violation, but that’s another editorial.)

It’s unlikely that any officers or staff NCOs are under 21, but that’s not the issue. The process of requiring identification for restricted purchases protects young people from themselves, so that teenage dependents don’t slip into Dad’s cammies and try to sneak a six-pack, and so underage Marines don’t get the stupid urge to pin on fresh butterbars and make a beer run.

The relaxed rules are a recipe for trouble. There’s no reasonable excuse for officers and staff NCOs to be walking around in uniform without an ID. Undo this policy before it’s implemented.