I did not make this choice. It was made for me.
Correctamundo. I’m that guy on the subway platform with the t-shirt showing a turkey with a mortarboard.
Odd. I read pretty carefully, here in Enwye as Cecil used to call it, and the Birth Certificate was a thing. It had to match my SS card.
I tried to apply for a Passport book renewal AND get a Passport card at the same time. No dice. Getting a “new” card involves Birth Certificates, etc.
I decided to kick this down the road. New Drivers’ License ( sorta unrelated, it was about to expire ) and new Passport book. Names match there.
By the time this new book expires, one of two things will be true:
- This will no longer be the United States of America and we will all have ID chips embedded,
Or
— A new Administration will tamp down some of these rules and I won’t go broke hiring an attorney to match things up.
That might have been true at some point but these are the current requirements. You only need one of a list that includes :
Valid U.S. Passport or Passport Card
U.S. Birth certificate issued by a state or local government
Thanks Doreen !!!
I think I’ve described this before. When I was born, my birth certificate read [made up name] Julius Greenstein. Within a year or so, my father, looking for a job in the depression, informally change his name to Green. By the time I was enrolled in kindergarten, it was under the name Green. When I applied for an SS card, I gave the name Green and still (72 years later) have that original card. When I got a passport, I had to get an affidavit from two people who knew me under both names that I was the same person. Fortunately, my parents were both alive since they were literally the only people in the whole world who knew me under both names. So I got a passport (and subsequent passports) under the name Green. When I immigrated to Canada I used my passport to show the name and there is no official record here of Greenstein. I naturalized under the name Green and now have a Canadian passport under that name. Then when I retired McGill wanted to see a birth certificate for actuarial purposes. So I wrote to Harrisburg, gave them my birth date and name, the name of the hospital, details like that. And they wrote back and said that if I could provide proof that I had been using Green for at least ten years, they would issue a birth certificate in that name. I photocopied a bunch of old passports and degree certificates and they sent back a birth certificate in the name Green. I still have it. That was around 1998. I don’t know if they would do it now. The name was never changed legally, BTW.
THAT is fascinating. Perhaps I should write to the county where I was born and ask them i they can accommodate me in a similar fashion……..
My sister used to go by her first name until college when she switched to her middle name. I went by my middle name until 2nd-3rd grade. That’s when I switched to my first name to avoid confusion with the three other guys in my class with that name. I’m glad I did that now for the reasons above. I might check with my sister to see if she gets crap from using her middle name.
Well. THAT was easy. About to have the PDF notarized. Official Birth Record name change. Will USPS it off to the state where I was spawned.
They tell me in a month it should be changed. I can call to check. Once confirmed, I can purchase for what I hope is a nominal fee per “copy”, an original raised seal copy of the new certificate.
I know enough to buy a few. Hell, when Dad died Mom bought ( at his instructions pre-mortem ), about 20 Death Certificates. Cause, turns out, almost all of the relevant agencies, banks, investment places, etc demand a genuine raised seal Certificate.
By August first I should be a new me !!! 
Then, and only then, can I go about getting a Real ID and perhaps a Passport Card as well.
Depends on the state and era.
When my wife died here in FL in 2021 the only genuine DC we used was filed with the probate court to prove they needed to open an estate.
Everybody else was happy w a color scan emailed to them. And might’ve been happy w a B&W fax. Banks, brokerages, life insurance companies, professional licensing bureaus, you name it.
Same in AZ & CA 20ish years ago when my parents died.
Hmmm. I do believe you. This may have been Dad’s highly-strung paranoia reaching from beyond the grave. His “When I’m Dead” document was, shall we say, comprehensive.
On the OTHER hand, the one senior partner in the law firm that handled Mom and Dad’s stuff sat in on the reading of the will. It took little time. He got a laugh from that document, then said after scanning it, " I wish all of our clients did this. "
Anyway, in this new Uubah-fascist state we’re all existing in, having multiples to be handed over never to be gotten back? I’d expect this to be the new norm. So, better too many “originals” than too few !!
We’ve had threads and threads on folks handling the estates of deceased parents, sibs, etc.
Assuming everyone involved is local, getting more DCs if needed later may be easy. Like 3 business days here.
I recall someone from another state saying that in their state it recently took 2 months and a notarized request form to get more DCs. Uggh!
That was my experience, too. Also, we turned out to need a copy of my dad’s death certificate to sell the house, because my mother hadn’t had the deed reissued to her alone. The lawyer picked one up on a day he had to stop by the country court anyway. He said it was easy, and didn’t bother to charge us for his time doing it.
Yeah, that was the case for me when my mother died a little while back in CA. Cursory online research indicated I might need multiple copies and being a conservative type (and I was warned that post-COVID the processing was slow, so I didn’t want to do it twice) I ordered a half dozen just in case.
Only ever needed the one, scanned. Granted there was no probate involved in her estate.
Why do you continue this mistaken idea that you need a birth certificate to get a Real ID when it has already been shown to you multiple times that you don’t.
I am posting this at 9:48 EST on Friday, June the 6th, 2025.
Yes, I am aware of what the NYS guidelines say today. Right now.
Are you possessed of some magickal crystal ball that allows you to inform the Dopers out there that discrepancies will not be cause for detention tomorrow, on Monday, on August 22nd…?
Fascinating. I prefer to look ahead with my eyes open.
I’m not going to tell you not to get the birth certificate changed - but there is a very big difference between “only then can I go about getting a Real ID” and “only then will I go about getting a Real ID”. * You absolutely can go get one now, without waiting for the new birth record. Choosing not to for whatever reason, is not the same as cannot.
*which you don’t even really need, as a passport will work just as well. So waiting is no problem.
Whatever man, I have no idea why you are making this so hard for yourself and creating problems where they don’t exist.
If you think getting a Real ID in New York City without a birth certificate will lead to you being put in detention tomorrow, I don’t know what to tell you other than try to come back into the real world.