Quote:
Originally Posted by BonzoHansen
What's your thoughts mtnhopper1? What does "..., or in a sufficiently limited quantity,..." mean legally? Grammatically, I read that as "originally manufactured...in a sufficiently limited quantity". Meaning now does not matter, time of manufacture does.
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When read with the other available designations, I think it
must mean cars made within the past 25 years. There already is a "historical vehicle" designation for older vehicles. It is a common statutory argument to say that where another statute directly addresses a particular issue (i.e. the "historical vehicle" statute), another ambiguous and seemingly duplicitive statute (the "collector" statute) must mean something else. The "collector vehicle" statute can't mean vehicles over 25 yrs old becasue those are already covered in the "historical" statute. If "collector" was intended to cover only older vehicles, why would anyone go through the trouble of having their 25+ year old car designated "collector" when they can get historical plates and be done with it without providing the additional proofs? Right? The "collector" designation would be useless, and legislators would NEVER waste time writing a useless law (Ugh! And ppl say lawyers lie!). The only other difference is the "display or educational demonstration" limitation on historical vehicles, but I think that is vague enough to cover whatever we do with our cars. Somerville on Fridays is unquestionably a "display" purpose.
As for the legal definition of "sufficiently limited quantity," that is one of those mushy phrases that get stuck into statutes that means the legislators who wrote the statute really meant to say: "we're going to leave it up to the administrators/courts to decide." "Sufficiently" isn't defined. What is "sufficient" depends on the person reviewing the file. The "proofs" provided need to explain the reason that late model cars can be collectable becasue the person reviewing the file probably doesn't care enough about it to think about it on their own. By writing the letter, we tell them what to think about it.
I really don't think the DMV is going to go much beyond was is sent to them to make the determination. It is unlikely that some DMV employee is going to do outside research to determine the legitimacy of a car club letter sent on club letterhead. Besides, they specifically ASK for a letter from a car club. NJFBOA is as legitimate a club as any to which I have belonged over the years. It has a community of enthusiasts, hundreds of members, a newsletter, regular meets, special events, etc, etc. Why would our club be any less legitimate than DuBz EaStSiDe LOW Boyzzzzz, or whatever? I can easily imagine some tool writing the same letter to argue that a 94 Caprice is collectable. Would that constitute "sufficiently limited quantities"? I think it might, for the same reason I think a 91 RS camaro qualifies... because people collect them, because enthusiasts buy them for the fact that they are Caprices (or because they can't afford Impalas). If Alex, or any of us wanted a regular daily driver, we would've each bought a new Yaris. In fact, there may even be Yaris enthusiasts out there for all I know. My apologies to the NJ Yaris owners association.
In any event, I would argue that the purpose of the statute was to allow enthusiasts who own vehicles that they consider collectable to own and operate those vehicles on a limited basis without having to meet the criteria required for daily drivers. Here's the trade off: the owner doesn't have to get the car inspected, but he can't use it as a daily driver. The proofs are required to show that driver's reason for owning the car is legitimately for its collectable value and not as its daily driver. The car club letter lends some legitimacy to the driver's claim that the car actually HAS collectable value because collectable value is show by the fact that people collect them. We collect them - they're collectable.
My GOD this post is long! I bet that's the last time you ask for my thoughts!