Birth registration

“ If there isn't a problem with a biology based birth registration regime, perhaps the concern lies in this particular regime's exceptions. For it turns out that Arkansas's general rule of registration based on biology does admit of certain more specific exceptions. Most importantly for our purposes, the State acknowledges that § 9-10-201 of the Arkansas Code controls how birth certificates are completed in cases of artificial insemination like the one before us. ”

“ As the census books and genealogy books show, every succeeding American generation has manifested a tendency to reduce the birth-rate. The new aspects of the situation are the acceleration of the tendency and the propaganda for family limitation by artificial methods. In the birth registration area, which includes twenty-three States, the number of births for the year 1919 compared with those for 1918 showed a slump of seven per cent. ”

“ The Government supervises and warmly supports 409the work of this Society and also aids by enforcing the most perfect system of birth registration in the world, without which the results of the work could not be accurately gauged. ”

“ The infant mortality rate is the number of deaths of babies which occur for every 1,000 live births. Figures in the United States are available only for that part of the country known as the registration area, where the reporting of births and deaths is legally required. It is important that the birth of every child should be registered, and that laws requiring registration should be enforced in every State. ”

“ As registration reports generally return the births of the foreign population in the same tables with the American, and as the term native is applied to all infants whose parents were born in this country, though of foreign descent, it will be at once seen how difficult it is to obtain the exact birth-rate separate of each class. ”

“ There is not now the fear which is said to have existed in Henry VIII.’s time, that a government register of births might be used for the purpose of a poll-tax; and as the operation of our registration system goes on, the difficulty in getting proof of age will be reduced to a minimum. When no official proof of age can be produced, offices, as a rule, co-operate with those interested, and admit the age when they have been satisfied that reasonable endeavour has been made to establish the correct date of birth. ”

“ If the identity document or certificate of particulars of birth seized had been issued to the person in question prior to the issue to him of the other identity document or certificate of particulars of birth and the Director-General is satisfied that such person’s race is reflected correctly on the first-mentioned identity document or certificate of particulars of birth, as the case may be, he shall return such identity document or certificate of particulars of birth to the person in question. ”

“ The Supreme Court in Wong Kim Ark cited with approval to an earlier decision of a federal circuit court, written by Supreme Court Justice Swayne sitting on circuit, explaining that
All persons born in the allegiance of the King are natural-born subjects, and all persons born in the allegiance of the United States are natural born citizens. Birth and allegiance go together. ”

“ Such interpretation, as evidenced by over a century of American case law, would include as natural born citizens those born in the United States and subject to its jurisdiction regardless of the citizenship status of one’s parents, [10] or those born abroad of one or more parents who are U.S. citizens (as recognized by statute) , [11] as opposed to a person who is not a citizen by birth and is thus an “alien” required to go through the legal process of naturalization to become a U.S. citizen. ”

“ Table I.—Illegitimate Births per 1000 Births (excluding still-born) . Table I. gives the number of illegitimate births per 1000 births in various countries of the world for quinquennial periods. It is to be noted that still-born births are excluded, as in the United Kingdom (contrary to the practice prevailing in most European countries) registration of such births is not compulsory. The United States is omitted, as there is no national system of registration of births. ”

“ Although the Supreme Court has never had to address the issue of “natural born” citizenship directly in the context of a challenge to the eligibility of one to be President, the federal courts have discussed the concept on numerous occasions for more than 200 years and have, other than in the Dred Scott decision, consistently relied upon the place of birth, without regard or reference to the status of one’s parents, as the determining factor of natural born citizenship. ”

“ The legal issues regarding “natural born” citizenship and birth within the United States, without regard to lineage or ancestral bloodline, have been well settled in this country for more than a century, and such concepts date back to, and even pre-date, the founding of the nation. ”

“ The civil code of France has placed a limit to our credulity respecting retarded births, and decrees three hundred days, or ten months, to be the most distant period at which the legitimacy of a birth shall be allowed. ”

“ A declaration signed by some person who, if the child had been born alive, would have been required to give information concerning its birth, to the effect that no registered medical practitioner was present at the birth, or that his certificate cannot be obtained, and that the child was not born alive ”

“ Evidence of paternity, in case of the father disowning the child, is to be established according to the form prescribed in Sections 140–144.
140. An unmarried woman who becomes pregnant shall give notice not later than three months before the birth of the child to the local Bureau of Vital Statistics of her place of residence, stating the time of conception, the name and residence of the father. ”

“ But this they will not do; they must have assurance doubly sure; they must have the written word of the child itself as soon as it is born, giving the parents indemnity from all responsibility on the score of its birth, and asserting its own pre-existence. They have therefore devised something which they call a birth formula—a document which varies in words according to the caution of parents, but is much the same practically in all cases ”

“ And just as she was recounting this, a servant from Schadeck called; and delivered to the Conrector, in return for a discharge and ratification of the birth-certificate given out by his mother, a gold bar of two-and-thirty ducat age-counters, like a helm-bar for the voyage of his life; Herr von Aufhammer was too proud to engage in any pettifogging discussion over a plebeian birth-certificate. ”

“ Native citizens.—An application containing the information indicated by rule 4 will be sufficient evidence in the case of a native citizen; except that a person born in the United States in a place where births are recorded will be expected to submit a birth certificate with his application. ”

“ But Arkansas law makes birth certificates about more than just genetics. As already discussed, when an opposite-sex couple conceives a child by way of anonymous sperm donation – just as the petitioners did here – state law requires the placement of the birth mother's husband on the child's birth certificate. See supra, at 2. And that is so even though (as the State concedes) the husband "is definitively not the biological father" in those circumstances. ”

“ Provided also that no such birth shall be registered unless the parents of such person declare, in such form and in such manner as may be prescribed, that the minor does not hold the passport of another country. ”

“ Every licensee must have a register wherein he shall enter the name and address of every maternity patient, the date of admission and discharge of every patient, the name and sex of every child born or boarded on the premises, the date of every birth, the legitimacy or illegitimacy of every child, the name and residence of the father, the date of removal of the child, the name and address of the person taking it away, and, if relinquished by the mother, the date of relinquishment, the name and address of the person to whom the child is relinquished, and the reasons therefor ”

“ The appointment of a Royal Commission to enquire into the decline of the birth-rate in the very sections of the population which most need to be maintained, is probably not very far off: the more far-seeing of those who know the facts have prophesied such a step for a long time past. ”