And how is that right enforced? The way it works here in Illinois, the mother fills out and signs the birth certificate application and the father is congratulated and possibly handed the hospital’s own ceremonial certificate with both parents’ names, but he has nothing at all to do with filling out or signing the legal one. The mother can put any name she wants - hers, his, yours or Rockefeller-Obama - in the last name blank.
Do you mind telling us what state you’re practicing in?
What?
So if Jane Doe & John Public have a child, John has absolute naming rights? She has to get permission from John to name their kid and in a dispute over the name the man always wins? I don’t disbelieve you, but wow. Could you post the cite for that?
I don’t know, but my sister’s lawyer said the kid has to have the husband’s last name in Arkansas.
That’s kind of what I was thinking. You marry someone, you have a kid with them, you put their name on the birth certificate. You don’t want their name on there, don’t have a kid with them.
If she’s married to him, he is legally the father, no matter what name she puts on the birth certificate. Birth certificates get changed all the time, they’re not set in stone as people believe. Changes are usually done by court order. If they weren’t married, the Recognition of Parentage (as it’s called in Mn, other states have different names) is the presiding legal document. They can only be changed for a certain time after birth, or by court order.
So, all in all, she can name Marvin the Martian as father, but legally her husband is it.
I’d be shocked if this were the law in CA, where I live – when we had our baby, the hospital insisted on always calling her “Baby [my last name].” She was never ever referred to as [husband’s last name] in any way by anyone, including the official who came to pick up the birth certificate forms we filled out. (Though we did give her my husband’s last name.)
But I guess I could believe there are other states where this is the law.
This isn’t about her. It’s the child’s birth certificate. The child has two parents and both should be on the birth certificate.
I am not a lawyer, but in most states, the legal code is based on English common law, which was established long before anyone knew about DNA.
Under English common law, if a couple is married, the husband is automatically assumed to be the father of any children his wife gives birth to, even if they all look just like the milkman.
So, in all likelihood, it doesn’t matter what the OP’s sister puts on a birth certificate. The sister’s husband is almost certainly the father in the eyes of the law, and he’ll have all the legal rights and responsibilities that come with being a father.
I was just reading elsewhere and read this: Ignoring the facts won’t change them.
I do think it’s important for people to know who their birth parents were. If not for sentimental reasons, then certainly for medical and historical ones.
Sometimes trying to hide the truth has unintended consequences.
Is there a limit to that?
People do some pretty screwed up stuff, even unforgivable stuff, and I can think of a number of acts that are indeed heinous enough that there would be no chance of me recognizing his name on my kid.
As someone whose father’s name is not on my birth certificate, & whose mother pretty much always hated my father, I say, yeah, put him on. For the record, for the sake of future genealogists, whatever. At least you know.
IANAL, but here is my best guess based on wide reading.
You can leave the birth certificate blank, but so what?
As mentioned above, absent other proof, the husband is assumed to be the father. If he wants visitation or custody, and someone questions paternity and rights, then a court-ordered DNA test will settle it. So if there’s no doubt about paternity, why bother keeping him off the BC?
If you want him to not have contact, then - I assume the lawyer told her this months ago - you have to prove he is unfit, or a danger. The best way to do this is to document every abusive or mentally unstable behaviour he ever displayed. A court pays mor attention to a journal that says “On day X he turned down a good job at A. On day Y he slapped me for asking him not use the word…; on Day Z he paid his psychic $300 to tell him we were going to have 2 more children…” (If you’re lucky, you get a black judge…)
Proper documentation may mean the difference between weekends and social-worker-supervised visits only. Unless the guy is a demonstrated danger, will the courts actually kep him away from his own child? Courts like this sort of detail much better than “all the time he was abusive and lazy.” In legal circles, like computer repair “happens all the time” means it happened twice.
Some states. if the mother ends up on social assistance, the welfare department will chase down the father for his share whether the mother wants child support or not.
Depending on the location, withdrawing this information may actually be illegal even if they weren’t married in the first place, which as has been mentioned makes the naming of the putative father automatic. IIUIC, it would be considered stealing from the kid, as you’re hiding from him/her information which rightfully belongs to him/her and which can be critical, both for medical reasons and for purposes of avoiding dates with your own siblings.
She should his name on the certificate.
But name him ‘Robert Downey Humperfuck’.
From my perspective, a birth certificate is not the place for editorializing; just the facts, ma’am. This man IS the father of this baby. The rest can get hashed out in courts and therapy sessions.
List the father on the birth certificate (unless there’s doubt that he’s the bio-dad), but I don’t see any reason why the kid should take his name. I assume the OP’s sister is going to resume using her maiden name after the divorce (if she ever used his name to begin with). She’s the one who gave birth and will likely get full custody who’ll actually be raising the kid; why shouldn’t the kid take her surname.
My advice is that she maintain as civil a relationship with him as humanly possible. After all, he will have visitation rights and possibly 50/50 custody of this child. Him being abusive to her won’t matter. Unless he is determined to be an unfit parent to this child, the court won’t deny him the right to spend time his own child.
I’d try very, very hard not to be hostile with anyone with that kind of power.
Meh, if you rape my kid sister or something, I feel no obligation to you whatsoever, and will gladly editorialize all I want. That may include trying to erase your name from history.
But if the kid’s got a genetic disease, no amount of erasing is going to help.
As for last names, my rule has always been that whoever gestates the fetus gets first naming rights.
Of course jerks can be fathers too and she must’ve liked him a little at one time. You can’t change history by pretending it didn’t happen. Is this how the baby is gonna start life? By the mother not facing reality. The reality is the jerk is the father and the sooner she and you and everyone else comes to terms with this the easier it will be in the long run