OPEN BORDERS HOW A FERRARI-OBSESSED BUREAUCRAT OPENED AMERICA TO A WORLD OF FORBIDDEN CARS.

FOR THOSE WHO WEREN'T alive or paying sufficient attention, it's hard to explain how grim the Seventies and Eighties were for car enthusiasts.

Particularly for those with any awareness of foreign cars for instance, the typical Road & Track reader. Newly enacted U.S. emissions and safety regulations choked the performance of cars sold here, while shrinking R&D budgets limited consumer choice as big manufacturers certified fewer models and engine families for sale. Meanwhile, several smaller foreign brands bowed out of the U.S. market entirely.

For many years, those who wished to partake in tasty automotive hardware sold elsewhere had three basic choices. They could (1) expend considerable effort and sums "federalizing" noncompliant cars from abroad, (2) emigrate, or (3) lump it.

Then, in 1988, came a quiet thunderbolt: the Imported Vehicle Safety Compliance Act, also known as the 25-year rule. An amendment to the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1966, it “exempts non-conforming foreign motor vehicles that are 25 years old or older (‘classic or antique’) from the restrictions imposed by this Act.” It was accompanied in due course by a maddeningly non-harmonizing regulatory amendment from the EPA that permitted the entry of non-emissions-compliant machinery at least 21 years old.

The effect of the rules would not be realized for some years, but beginning in the late Nineties, the amendment’s impact became apparent. Forbidden fruit—Alfa Romeo Montreals, late-model Fiat Dinos, MGB GT V8s from the early Seventies— could be imported to America for nothing more than the price of purchase, applicable duties, and shipping fees.