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Say someone gives birth, but neither they nor their apparent partner/spouse will answer any questions about what the resulting child is supposed to be named. They are cooperative in all other ways, willing to sign off on any relevant birth certificate forms, and so on, but when asked to state or write down a name for the child, they don't.

Will the child be issued a birth certificate? If so, under what name?

Can the parents get in any kind of trouble for doing this? (Illegal failure to report a birth due to the forms not being filled out properly, child abuse due to causing obvious bureaucratic problems for the child, etc.)

The answer probably differs by state; I'm interested in answers for any particular US state.

interfect
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8 Answers8

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This is not a rare occurrence, and the parents don't get in trouble. A birth certificate is issued with the last name of one or both of the parents and in the space reserved for the first name is the "name" Male or Female, depending on the gender of the infant.

So if Mr. and Mrs. Smith have a baby girl, the name on the birth certificate is Female Smith. Once the parents decide on a name, there is a mechanism for updating the birth certificate.

I truly don't know how New York authorities handle multiple births or intersex babies.

Source: Personal knowledge. My father, born in New York, initially had a birth certificate showing the first name Male, then a later version showed his given name. Both were issued in the early 20th century.

MTA
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The Registrar

s21 of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1995 provides that where the parents cannot agree, or where they agree on a prohibited name, the Registrar is required to name the child.

s22 empowers the District Court to resolve disputes about names and order the register changed. It also provides that if any other state or Federal court makes an order about a name, the Registrar is to update the register.

ohwilleke
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Dale M
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12

Child's name must be registered to the national civil registry within 3 months after birth. After this the registry's first action is to simply send a letter with a reminder and a new copy of the form to fill.

A newborn is assigned its social security number within a few days after being born, and this is used for all official identification purposes. Lacking a name for a few months doesn't present much practical trouble.

If parents still fail to register a name, social services are contacted to take a look into the matter. You could regard this as "getting into trouble", as the idea clearly is that if the parents fail to register the name, there may be other trouble in the family.

But if the parents are perfectly capable as parents and simply refuse to submit the form, court will assign a trustee for the child who will assign a name and fill the form.

(Source: Minilex)

jpa
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A relative of mine had much difficulty applying for a state ID in Illinois because their Ohio birth certificate (ca 1935) had the "Name" field left blank. Apparently their parents hadn't yet chosen a name when the hospital issued the birth certificate, so the name was simply not filled in. An official copy of the birth certificate was requested from Ohio in 2023, and the copy retained the blank "Name" field.

So it would seem that in Ohio, in the 1930s, an unnamed child would receive a birth certificate with no name on it whatsoever.

Crash Gordon
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In Austria you don't get in trouble for not naming your child.

If you fail to do so after 40 days, the child will be given a first name (and last name if also unknown) by the head of state ("Landeshauptmann") of the federal state ("Bundesland"). He has to choose a common name for this; in practice this will be done by some administrator and not the "Landeshauptmann" himself.

This is also done for a person who has no documents and their name is unknown, not only for newborns.

psmears
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kirbby
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In Norway, you get six months to name your child. If you don't, the government gives the child the mother's last name, and picks a first name. (Usually, the locally most popular first name.) It is assumed that people want to name their children themselves, so they get warned that this is about to happen.

Helge Hafting
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You get fined.

The specific legislation governing births is the (heavily amended) Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953. You have 42 days to register a birth, but you do not need to name the child at that point. You have a year from birth to do so, and if not, you have broken the law.

Where, before the expiration of twelve months from the date of the registration of the birth of any child, the name by which it was registered is altered or, if it was registered without a name, a name is given to the child, the registrar or superintendent registrar having the custody of the register in which the birth was registered, upon delivery to him at any time of a certificate in the prescribed form signed...

The punishment for not doing this is given elsewhere in the Act:

Save as provided in [F22section 7], a registrar shall not register the birth of any child after the expiration of [F2112 months] from the date of birth F23. . . , from the date of the finding, and any person who registers any birth, or causes any birth to be registered, in contravention of this section shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding [F24level 1 on the standard scale].

A level 1 fine currently stands at £200.

David A. Craven
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In upper Midwest states, in the 1970’s I’ve seen “Baby Boy” used for the firstname and last was the mother’s lastname. In the 1990’s-2000’s I’ve seen “Baby A” and “Baby B” used for the firstname field.

(Source: Working with HL7 hospital data feeds.)

dbeasy
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