If there's a way to avoid clogging the border with traffic backed up by identification verification procedures, why not find it? And that's the opening that Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott may have found this week with a ruling that driver's licenses with an embedded computer chip can be used, if the federal government will go along with the idea.

The Abbott ruling is the first state official to give the go-ahead signal to the enhanced driver's licenses that have been proposed by state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, and border officials as a way to solve the problem of tighter border security without bringing the normal flow of commerce and tourism at the Texas-Mexico border to a near stand-still.

The use of the new driver's licenses still faces hurdles, most notably the reluctance of Gov. Rick Perry. Perry has been hesitant to enact a program that might then be nixed by the federal government as not meeting standards of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, the legislation that wiped out the "honor system" of verifying citizenship by Americans returning from Mexico and Canada. But it is the federal government which has been pushing states to come up with the enhanced drivers licenses as an alternative to expensive passports. Washington state has been the first state to put an enhanced drivers license program into operation.

A pilot driver's license program was approved by the Legislature. The license would be optional, would be available to American citizens who could obtain it by presenting a U.S. passport, or a U.S. birth certificate or U.S. naturalization papers combined with a driver's license. The licenses would cost a few dollars more than it now costs to renew a license. The enhanced license would have a bar code that could be read electronically at the border to verify the citizenship of the holder.

For frequent border crossings, the license could be a cheaper, quicker way to document citizenship without all the downsides that now seems about to visit the border with the advent of new documentation procedures. Frustrated with delays in implementing new documentation procedures -- a requirement that U.S. passports be used has now been set back to 2009 Homeland Security will next month require that American citizens, in lieu of a passport, document their citizenship with a birth certificate or naturalization papers along with a government-issued ID. Checking each border crosser could add delays since birth certificates are not standardized among the states. Local border community officials from Brownsville to El Paso fear that the longer wait times could all but bring traffic at border bridges to a halt for hours.

For border economies, the traffic tie-ups could be devastating. The number of crossings number each year in the millions -- more than 14 million each at Laredo and Brownsville in 2006 -- are an indication of how much each side of the Rio Grande is dependent on the other in terms of trade, consumers and cultural exchanges. The impact of a frozen border, however, would likely be felt across Texas.

The governor's office says the governor has questions he needs answered about the enhanced licenses. How will it work in conjunction with Passport Cards? This is another proof of citizenship, issued by the federal government, that can be used at land border crossings, for which American can begin applying on Feb. 1. Fine. The governor should satisfy himself that Texas will be on firm legal ground, but he shouldn't wait too long in coming to a decision. The state and border communities need to keep the traffic moving.