MAWORCES-L Archives

From:
Subject: Access to Birth Records Threatened
Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 17:33:42 EST

FROM THIS WEEKS NEWSLETTER FROM THE NEHGS -
If you have not e-mailed your representatives about this yet - please
do.
Access to Birth Records Threatened
The threat of further restrictions and the possibility of outright denial of
access to vital records have loomed over the heads of genealogists for years.
Records vital to researchers are proving more difficult and more costly to
obtain, while concerns over privacy and identity theft continue to mount.
The most serious challenge to accessibility was recently submitted to the
House of Representatives in the form of bill HR.10, which has passed through the
House and is now included in a Senate bill known as S.2845. If the bill
passes, individuals requesting birth records would be required to provide the name
on the certificate, the date and location of birth, the mother's maiden name,
and substantial proof of their own identity. Additionally, if the requester is
not named on the birth certificate, the state will require the requester to
present legal authorization to request the birth certificate before issuance.

In October, David Rencher, chairman of the Record Access and Preservation
Committee, a joint committee of the National Genealogical Society (NGS) and
Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS), sent a letter to the bill's sponsor,
Congressman J. Dennis Hastert, recommending an amendment to the bill that made a
distinction between certified and non-certified copies and excluded records
more than 100 years old. This recommendation was ignored, and will not be
considered by the Senate as part of S.2845.
In the most recent RootsWeb Review newsletter, readers were encouraged to
write to their senator and suggest an addition to Sec. 3061 (b)(1)(A)(iii). The
proposed addition would read who is alive on the date that access to their
birth certificate is requested, which would be added as number (iii), under (A),
in the excerpt from the bill shown below.
The term 'birth certificate' means a certificate of birth--
(A) for an individual (regardless of where born)--
(i) who is a citizen or national of the United States at birth; and
(ii) whose birth is registered in the United States; and

(B) that--
(i) is issued by a Federal, State, or local government agency or authorized
custodian of record and produced from birth records maintained by such agency
or custodian of record; or
(ii) is an authenticated copy, issued by a Federal, State, or local
government agency or authorized custodian of record, of an original certificate of
birth issued by such agency or custodian of record
NEHGS strongly urges all of its members and readers of eNews to join the
effort in allowing reasonable access to vital records for research purposes.
Please take a moment to write your senator and suggest the addition to the bill
noted above. For a list of email addresses of U.S. senators, visit
http://rd.bcentral.com/?ID=2378525&s=56351935.
The full text of S.2845 can be read at
http://rd.bcentral.com/?ID=2378529&s=56351935. Type S.2845 in the bill number window and then select item # 3; then
go to subtitle B - Identity Management Security; chapter 2 - Improved Security
for Birth Certificates.
For more information on this and other issues regarding records of interest
to genealogists, visit the FGS Records Preservation and Access Committee page
at http://rd.bcentral.com/?ID=2378524

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