The problem I have with this is that we essentially already have a national ID system. Social Security numbers are ubiquitous despite their original intention t

The problem I have with this is that we essentially already have a national ID system. Social Security numbers are ubiquitous despite their original intention to not be used for identification because there's no existing national alternative. Everybody knows how stupid this system is yet we've painted ourselves into a corner and I don't think we'll ever walk back our reliance on it as an ID unless there's legislation mandating it and publishing it for everyone that has one assigned. Personally I think there is some constitutional justification for a national ID system. The commerce clause gets abused a lot IMHO but identity is at the core of just about any contract. You could argue that state identification and plain old name, address, signature are sufficient, but it's not like SSNs are ubiquitous for no reason. Even as dumb as it is to use a single number for someone that never changes, the benefits of a single static identifier that is the same across a person's lifetime and established by the government outweighs the horrific insecurity of it all. Fundamentally a government is the root authority of legal identity for all the citizens of that country. The government should provide a modern secure way of establishing identity for both public and private matters.