But if the guy’s never around, does the kid really have a Dad? And if that’s the case, the name’s basically meaningless.
(This may not be the case with my niece – you’re correct that there are lots of things I don’t know. I’m being theoretical.)
This might be why this sticks in my craw. Why would it be the default option if the (theoretical) mom does 100% of the parenting?
It’s the default simply because it’s the most common. And once it’s the most common situation for whatever reason, a lot of people will follow the pattern simply because it is the most common.
I know lots of people who as kids had a different name from their mother. Sometimes the mother didn’t change her name when she got married and gave the kids her husband’s name. Sometimes the mother got remarried and changed her name. Sometimes the mother never married the father but gave the kid(s) his name anyway. I only know two people who didn’t have their father’s name. In one case, I’m not even sure the mother knew who the father was*. The other was adopted by his stepfather and had his name ( not sure what his name was before the adoption).
*The mother is a cousin of mine, and we met every boyfriend that lasted more than a couple of months. But we never met her first kid’s father - might have been a one night stand.
I know a guy who was on his second marriage to a woman who was also on her second marriage. They ended up with a yours/mine/ours set of kids. She was a nurse and told him, “If anything ever happens to me, remember that my son doesn’t really belong to my ex.” In other words, she’d had an affair, the kid had a health condition that had a genetic component, and the ex always assumed he was the father but he wasn’t. IOW even when the last name is the same, the relationship can’t be assumed.
Also if I were a single mom, and if the baby daddy were a bad dude (say I got drunk one night and made a bad choice with a really bad guy), I might think twice before giving his claim to parentage any help.
In lots of cultures/countries, including some quite traditional and patriarchal ones, women don’t take their husbands’ last names when they marry, but the kids generally end up with their father’s last name. Nobody would blink an eye at a kid having a different last name from his/her mother. The marital status of the parents would have nothing to do with it.
I speak of my wife and daughter here, but we’re not legally married, and I am not the birth father. Minor technicalities…
Anyway, a counterexample. My wife got married and took the guy’s name. It wasn’t a good marriage. After a couple of years, she unintentionally got knocked up. A couple of months into the pregnancy, she decided she was done with him. But, she was determined not to have her child out of wedlock. So she left him, but didn’t pursue divorce right away.
My daughter was born, and my wife gave Daughter her maiden name. Because she planned to go back to it as soon as the divorce was final. She filed divorce papers within a week of Daughter’s birth.
Wife never pursued child support, because it wasn’t worth the hassle of having her ex in her life. He has never laid eyes on his daughter, and never cared to come looking. Which suits us just fine. We have no idea whatever happened to him. He’s probably in jail somewhere.
I think the issue is that not giving the baby the father’s name is likely to be perceived by the father and others as an intentional statement that you actively do not want the father involved. Basically a huge fuck you to him and his family. Right now, in our culture, it simply can’t be a neutral act. Hyphenate? Fine. But to not put his name on the birth certificate at all isn’t a passive act of waiting for him to step up or not, it’s a proactive expression that you don’t consider him involved or to have any real place in the baby’s life.
This is probably accurate, although I still feel like giving a child someone’s last name is a wildly disproportionate gesture just to make sure someone’s feelings aren’t hurt.
And can’t you put the father’s name on the child’s birth certificate without giving the child the father’s last name?
Sure. But the act of doing so it still symbolic. It’s aggressively going against a really established custom. If two parents are in agreement about that, it’s cool, but to do that against the father’s wishes is literally saying “As far as I am concerned, from day one you have absolutely no input into this child’s life. You don’t get a say.”. I think a lot of men would react very negatively to that.
ETA: It’s not so his feelings don’t get hurt. It’s so he knows that you consider him a co-parent and that you hope he will play an active role in your child’s life. If someone is at all a decent person, saying “I actively don’t want you in this kid’s life and I don’t think this kid has anything to do with you, really” is a disservice to your child. Pushing away her dad, actively discouraging his involvement in her life, is not in her best interest.
AFAICT, nowhere in this thread have you considered the possibility that your wife’s niece has discussed the issue with the father of her child, and that the choice of name was a joint decision by both parents.
I have no idea whether or not that’s what happened, but it seems a bit weird to me that you’re not even taking into account a possible scenario where the parents were both involved in choosing the surname of their mutual child.
A child isn’t a sports stadium where you earn the naming rights depending on the amount of your financial sponsorship. I mean, parents can allocate naming rights on that basis if they want to, but it seems bizarre to assume that that will be the default basis for deciding a child’s surname.
Yes, you can - but if you want the father on the birth certificate, and you’re not married, then, in the US, the father has to sign a form - I’m not in the US so don’t want to try to pretend to be an expert on this when other people here probably know better. In the UK, an unmarried father has to be physically present when registering the birth unless there’s a compelling reason, like military service, in which case there’s a similar legal form.
The basic point is, if she wants her child to be legally registered with both parents on the birth certificate, which is usually a sensible thing to do, he will be involved in that. And that means there might be a tricky conversation about what surname the child is going to have.
The other reasons make sense too. I’m a single parent, and have known a lot of single parents, and it has always seemed a little odd that a Dad who barely sees his kids gets to give them his name, but it might well be a good decision overall.
Plus, this “Dad” isn’t with the Mom, and you think they don’t expect him to play a large part in the baby’s life, but that means that he’s still around somewhat - he hasn’t actually run away. It’s not unknown for Dads to step up once the kid’s got past the difficult toddler years.
Great analogy. And you’re right, there may have been all kinds of conversations.
Maybe not, but what a raw deal for the mom! If I had bailed on my wife for the first 3-4 years of our son’s life and then tried to “step up,” my body would have never been found.
In the states, if the parties are not married they can willingly sign a Recognition of Parentage (some states call it a Declaration of Parentage). It essentially affirms the legal relationship between parents and child. Once signed, parties have two years to appeal it.
It is separate from a birth certificate. Birth certificates can easily be amended by a simple court order to add / change / remove a name.
If no RoP/DoP is signed, a court order would be obtained establishing paternity. It is not uncommon to see a paternity order which not only legally sets the father but also changes the child’s last name. At which point the birth certificate would be amended to reflect the legal father and child’s new surname.
TBH, for unmarried parents, birth certificates don’t really mean a heck of a lot.
My mother is in the exact opposite situation. She divorced my dad when I was young and returned to her maiden name and in the 80s in small town new york she would always be addressed by my teachers as “Mrs. Ludovicslastname”.
Then she married again and had another child and then divorced again. But she kept her second married name despite the divorce to make it easier for my sister, even though fewer people care about it anymore.
Or even more commonly, make the Big Hero Dad Comeback when the kids are teenagers, probably so they can party with them, and just maybe sleep with their friends.
For the kids, birth certificates can potentially make a big difference. They can matter when it comes to nationality, inheritance (even if the Dad is a deadbeat, he might have an uncle or something who’s not), and, probably, just being certain about your heritage.
Dads turning up later is very unfair on the mother, but probably better for the kid.
We’ve become accustomed to believing birth certificates are the be all / end all.
For children born to unwed parents, until there is a court order, it’s not.
When I had my kid, I could’ve put George Washington on the birth certificate. Or left it blank. I did put her dad’s name on it anyways AND we signed a RoP/DoP at the hospital. It just made the whole paternity court matter go much more smoothly.
If I had put George Washington or left the birth certificate blank, or no RoP/DoP signed, then the paternity order (once established) would’ve directed the Department of Health to correct the birth certificate.
It was the court order that established paternity and the birth certificate follows. So until paternity is established legally, the RoP or DoP, if signed, is the legal document showing parentage.
Yes, once legal parentage is established, the birth certificate does become the standard form of identification.
Having a kid out of wedlock can be very messy.
But could you have put George Washington without a letter stating that he was the father, or someone with that name being there? What I looked up said that you just put any old name.
In the UK the birth certificate is proof of parentage, but that’s partly because, like I said, for unmarried parents the father has to be there to register the birth and be on the certificate (unless he’s serving in the military, etc; then there’s a legal document he has to sign). There’s no possibility of putting some random dude’s name down.
If you really can put any man’s name down as the father then I can see why they’re pretty much meaningless, but is that really the case?
As with all legal questions involving the USA, there are at least 50 different detailed answers that may or may not fall into 2 or 3 loose groupings.
Story I’ve told before that happened to a friend (really!).
Man & wife got married in a conservative Bible Belt state, then settled down to live in that state. Marriage later falls apart so they get a legal court-sanctioned separation, but never file for divorce. He moves to a different state and never lays eyes on her again. Several years later she becomes pregnant.
A few months later separated husband discovers that a) his name is on the birth certificate, and b) as a matter of state law he is the father and on the hook for support until / unless any other man volunteers to take his place. The wife never identified anyone as the father to the birth registration authorities. She didn’t have to; the state simply assumes as a matter of law that the husband is the father, period.
Cue expensive fight to dis-establish husband’s paternity over both her and the state’s heartfelt objections and to expedite getting the divorce he should have done much earlier.
Such is the logic of birth records in the land of Jeebus!!!
I think the difference is in the UK the birth certificate is the first and foremost legal document. In the states, it is not for unmarried parents. There is a process to obtain the birth certificate.
AND, side note, some parents don’t bother with the courts. If the dad signed the birth certificate, and it’s registered with the state, it’s all good to go.
This does lead to fathers down the road contesting paternity, genetic tests, disestablishment orders, etc.
I’ve seen that happen more than a few times and it can be really messy. Incorporating dissolutions with paternity actions. Amended birth certificates. And, in the situation you wrote, unless she names someone else, husband remains the legal father.