|
Legal
Name Change Project
To complement online guides to amending
your birth certificate, notably the pages maintained by Becky
Allison, this section is a guide to court orders for name change
by state, province, or country. Neglecting this important first step is a major
way young people in our community are "kept in their place."
Disclaimer: This is legal talk, not legal advice. Laws vary by state, and some of the information discussed on this page may not be applicable in your case. I cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information and provide it without warranty. Laws change and this information may contain errors and omissions. It is up to you to confirm any information herein by doing your own research.
Contents
Introduction
Submissions needed!
If you have first-hand experience with
the process within the last few years, you have valuable information that can
help our young people help themselves. Please contact me to help.
Why we need this
One powerful system by which our youngest and most vulnerable members are kept
in the ghettoes of gender is through the law. We have to jump through legal
hoops to get our documentation changed to reflect our chosen name and gender.
Some states make this extremely difficult. Many young transgender people are
reluctant to take legal steps to get their names changed because they don't
want to deal with the hassle, or because they find official acknowledgement
of their wrongly-identified gender and old name to be extremely embarrassing,
especially in an institutional setting like a courtroom.
This can lead to difficulties getting work in mainstream society. They worry
about filling out job applications where a background check might reveal their
old information. When mainstream employment is not available, the best available
options are frequently low-income work in underground economies such as "under
the table" odd jobs, cash-only employment in service industries, or potentially
lucrative/dangerous work dealing drugs, or working in the sex industry. The
longer this legal limbo continues, the harder it becomes to assimilate into
mainstream society.
Often the process seems confusing or intimidating, too. This section seeks
to remedy that.
A special note to young readers
Making these legal changes is essential for things like marriage and
most careers. If you want to live a quiet happy life in mainstream society,
these legal steps are absolutely necessary. In fact, failure to do them when
you are young could lead to much worse problems later. Women in several states
have been named in highly publicized landmark court cases because they didn't
bother to take care of the legal documents we need in order to protect our rights in the eyes of the law. You don't want to be all over television with
them using your old name, right?
When Gwen Araujo was murdered in 2002, the press frequently used her male name
because she had not taken steps to change her name. Calpernia didn't change
her name until Barry was killed. Luckily, she was able to get that done before
the press and the court learned what was still her legal name at the time, but
that's not always the case.
An ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure in this case. Get your legal
documents taken care of as soon as possible. You'll thank me later!
Court Order For Name Change
Before you commit legally to a name, I recommend reading my page on choosing
a name.
I recommend getting a court order for name change before anything else. You
will not run into any problems if you get this document first, since everyone
accepts it as valid proof. Other documents might not be adequate in some cases.
The process is often easy, but it varies by state. Some people have had a very
difficult time with this step. Much depends on your state, and on the sympathy
of the judge you get.
This might look like a huge hassle, but it's not that bad. I'm just including
all the information someone might need. Because these are sort of unusual, the
person at the courthouse who helps you might need to know some of the information
below. Print out the stuff for your state and take it with you.
Some people have been able to switch official documents without a court order
for name change. If you cannot afford the costs for this document in your state
(which may be more or less), check with local transgender people and support
networks for information on other successful methods in your state. However,
I believe this is the most hassle-free way to proceed, since it carries the
weight of judicial decree and will not be questioned.
You cannot change your name to avoid financial obligations or to commit fraud.
The judge may ask you about this, including whether you have any judgments against
you in court, if you have ever been convicted of a felony, if your taxes have
been paid, or if you have declared bankruptcy. You can often usually still change
your name despite some of the reasons above, but I suggest working with a legal
professional since it may be more complicated.
You can do all this yourself, but if you feel like you'd rather have someone
help you, try to find a person you know who has already done this, or a family
member, or you can pay a legal professional to help.
There are four basic steps:
1. Start the process
This is usually done by filling out a petition for change of name with
the clerk of the circuit court, usually in the chancery division. Call your
county government offices to find out where you need to go.
You can also get the forms for your state for a fee from US Legal Forms.
Plan ahead! If you have a target date for going full-time, you should find
out how long it will take to get a court date. For instance, the earliest
I could get a court date was over seven weeks from the date I registered.
Once you have your court order in hand, you should plan on additional time
to get your Social Security card changed. Most report getting their new
one in about a week from the day they applied.
At any rate, each state is different, so find out from others in your state
how long the entire process took for them.
2. Take care of pre-hearing requirements
The process for this varies widely by state. You may be required to publish
a legal notice of your name change prior to your court date. If so, the
chancery office where you go probably will refer you to a publication in
which you can run your notice, usually for a fee.
You'll be given petition to fill out, which may ask for old and new names,
address, length of state residency, and place of birth. You may also be
given an affidavit which has to be signed by a friend acquainted with you
who knows your birth name. This may need to be filled out in the presence
of a notary public and notarized.
You will usually be assigned a court date at this time.
3. Show up on your assigned court date.
If you have an option, I'd recommend doing it as early as possible so you
can spend the rest of the day getting the ball rolling on other name change
applications.
What you will need to do will vary by state. Here's common checklist for
before you see the judge
- Completed petition and copies
- Money for legal notice publication (may accept only cash and certified
checks)
- Notarized affidavits acknowledging birth name
- Proof of legal notice publication
- Money for court costs (may accept only cash and certified checks)
- Photo identification with old name (just in case)
- Letter from your therapist (just in case)
4. Get any certified copies you will need
I returned to the chancery office to get certified copies of the signed
judgment for $6 each. I got half a dozen just in case, but I probably won't
need half that many. You'll need to send certified copies to some financial
institutions and government agencies, which will NOT accept photocopies
or notarized copies.
Changing name in Washington State
Washington State has one of the most liberal name change procedures in the United States. In some cases, it may be worth following the instructions for out-of-state residents. It may be easier and cheaper than your state of residence.
Changing name without mention of transition
Most courts are very reluctant to police name changes on the grounds of their
being "inappropriate for your sex." This opens up a huge area of law
they'd rather not get into. Because of this, you are within your rights to choose
any name. If the judge rejects your application, you are also within your rights
to ask the reason. If you are rejected and have the judge on record saying he
felt the name was not appropriate, you can probably get your case re-heard or
appealed. Most higher courts would overturn a name change request denial on
the grounds of inapproriate for your gender.
A reader also sends along this suggestion:
In many areas transsexuals may have a hard time getting their name changed
due to prejudiced judges. Well, I know of a way around it. File for the name
change as you would otherwise, but for the reason of the change put that you
simply do not like your present name (a perfectly valid reason), and make
no mention of your transsexuality. To do this, you must still be passable
in guy mode and go to the courthouse in guy mode. This may seem crazy, but
remember that nowhere in the U.S. does the law designate names as for males
or females only, and that there have been many accounts of non-TS people changing
there names to some very bizzare things. The painful part for the TS might
be having to go to the courthouse in guy mode and especially the feeling of
a man asking to change his name to a typically female name. However, since
the judge will never know about your transsexuality, he/she won't have the
transsexual prejudice. As long as you weren't doing something illegal or fradulent,
there should be no problems getting your new name, except for the temporary
embarrasment. Once you get this order, though, you can assume your new role
with no embarrasment about your name.
Here's another possible option from a reader:
There is another way that transsexuals can hopefully get around an anti-TS
judge. That would be to file citing the reason as that you have used your
desired name in certain situations (business, with friends, etc., whatever
would apply to you) and that you would like to legalize it. Obviously, if
you want to be honest to the judge, you would have to use your new name in
some way for awhile before legalizing it, and be able to prove it.
The advantage here is that you make no mention of you're TS status directly,
yet you're stilll acting in a professional and legal way.
Of course, your old name may give your status away, but if you're lucky in
that:
the forms for where you live are unisex (i.e., for example, it says "Petitioner
wishes to change his/her name from (old name) to (new name)", like
they are in my state), rather than using only male or female pronouns,
that you are not required to show something to the judge with your current
gender marked on it (which you don't have to show anything like
that to the judge where I live, just possibly to the clerk),
and you pass well,
the judge may possibly assume you are just a woman born with a male name
but wants to have a female name. Even if one of the three points mentioned
above aren't true for you or where you live, since the petition does not directly
mention your TS status, that may make it harder for the judge to deny it on
those grounds, especially if you can prove your usage of the name as mentioned
in the first paragraph.
Of course, there's always the "man wanting a woman's name" technique
that was mentioned on another letter of advice from me, but this one is less
embarrasing and a little more professional.
A note to those who may be divorcing
A reader writes in August 2003:
Hey Andrea, one thing you may want to add about name changes is that it is
pretty trivial to change your name as part of a divorce.
The advantages of doing it this way are:
1. no extra fees are required
2. there really is no process
The disadvantages are:
1. you will be outed during the divorce. Not a problem for me since I was
full time before we had the first court date for divorce.
2. your name change will be buried in the middle of a potentially large
document. Mine was 25 pages long and I just copied the first page, last
page, and page with the name change in it for those few places that needed
proof of name change. I also blacked out all non-pertinent parts of the
pages that were copied.
This route would be a viable option if someone is getting a divorce and the
court is aware of you being transsexual.
This is true, though the laws are designed to help women lose their married
names, it work the other way as well. Might be a stress-reduced way to deal
with name stuff during an otherwise stressful time.
However, another reader writes:
According to California law in 1993, I could only change my name through
my divorce papers if I was going to go back to using my maiden name. If I
remember correctly, the paperwork was limited to a box to check stating that
I was going to return to using my maiden name and then a space to list it.
Since I was not, I had to go through the legal name change process. The name
change itself was an easy and painless process, but I could not incorporate
the name change into my divorce filings.
I just thought you might want to consider mentioning that it might not be
possible for everyone to change his or her name through their divorce proceedings.
Changing name and gender with same court order
A reader writes:
I know of two cases where the petition to the court not only requested the
name change but also a request for re-classification of Gender Assignment.
This has the advantage of getting a court order stating that you are to be
classified as the requested gender and it overrides all sorts of objections
from authorities regarding birth certificates, driver's license, passport,
etc., even if you're pre-op.
Just as a gender biased judge may reject your name change, there are many
sympathetic judges out there who don't mind helping you out.
I have a hearing and I've included the Gender Reassignment request. I'm using
a lawyer even though the process is quite simple because I figured she may
have better insight to the legal aspects. In fact my lawyer called the judge
and ran it by her and the report back is that the judge will have no problem
signing it.
On the other hand, I don't want to draw too much attention to this "loop
hole" if you can call it that, because if it gets too much publicity
or opposition the judges may be influenced to reject the petitions.
Here is a PDF of the blank court
order that worked for this applicant.
A young reader in California wrote to me in July 2004 after succeeding in doing
this:
Hey! I thought I would share my name change experience with you b/c it might
be somewhat helpful. I'm in CA and I went to court earlier this week and my
petition was to change name and gender. I got a packet with the various name
change options and my mother suggested that I try and change my gender now,
even though I have not had srs. So on my court date I took in a note from
my regular family doctor the stated that I had undergone irreversible and
permanent physical changes and it worked ^_^. The judge lady let me change
name and gender. Anyway, I don't know if that is a common occurrence or not
... so I just wanted to mention it. Besides that, I'm currently unemployed
but I have a job waiting for my return. I was kinda stealth at work ... only
my boss knew. So I had concerns about everyone else finding out so I took
some time off while doing my legal stuff. I think last time I wrote you was
like a year ago and I sent you a picture and told you about new friends I've
been making. I finally got my voice down also. As soon as I started working
last summer I was just tossed into stealth at work so the pressure kinda helped
me along really well. OK... I'm finished rambling. I'm gonna attach some more
pictures =p
My response:
Wow, congratulations! I am delighted that worked out for you. I have been
telling women to get a note like that if they have an orchiectomy, but I
will start suggesting that they get a note saying they “have undergone
irreversible medical feminization procedures” or something like that.
Based on letters I get, it seems this is more likely to go the way it did
for you if the petitioner is totally female in appearance.
We are in the process of migrating our sites to a new host, but I will
expand on my name change section a bit to incorporate this great tip. You
have a pretty smart mom! ;) Thanks again for helping to make this easier
for others by sharing your experiences!
An option for some with "passing privilege"
I got this note from a reader in March 2004. I was able to do the same thing
at a busy DMV branch in January 1998 after getting my card. I inspected it and
told the guy there was a mistake and showed him the "M." He said,
"I guess there is," and sent me to a special line where they made
the correction on the spot.
My last report (August 2003) illustrated that I had a really difficult time
getting all of the paperwork in order. However, last week I went to the DMV
to get the sex (and height - I was 2" taller on record) corrected. I
had absolutely no problems at all - in and out in a record 20 minutes.
I just told the clerks that my license said I was 5'8" and that I was
male (!!). I told them that, well, I'm female and 5'6" and they graciously
changed it without requesting the letter from my doctor I had with me. The
clerk that finally entered the data correction said that the person who entered
the data (in 2003 when I had it updated for name change) "must have had
their fingers on the wrong keys."
The moral of the story is, approach the sex change on the license as a mistake
in data entry and you might have a very easy time. Only use your documentation
if they need more info "Well, we can't really change it..."
For the record, I am still (alas) pre-op, but I pass very well.
As always, it is better to do everything with the proper legal documentation
to avoid problems now and later. A reader writes:
Hi! I thought I would let you know how my id changes have been going. To
start with I had the court change my gender as well as my name at the same
time ... however, having a court order to change gender really means just
about nothing to all these id people >=l. When I got my social security
card they still demanded a doctors note and I mean I thought that was ok.
Then at the dmv, I gave them the court order and doctors note and they said
that still wasn't enough =/. The guy made me take some medical form to my
doctor to be filled out. And today I got my id..... which still has "sex:
m". And I'm totally filled with rage! I thought a COURT ORDER would mean
something to these people and then I jumped through all there other hoops
and still I get a "sex:m" It makes me wonder if they even changed
it on my social card info =/ Anywayz... I just kinda needed to vent to someone
that could understand... =p well.. I'm sure I'll e-mail you again so until
then...
Residency issues and REAL ID
A reader sent some interesting information on changing your name in a lenient state by setting up a residency there. The same reader sent the folling information about the REAL ID laws proposed in 2005:
Another name and identification issue that exists, beyond the REAL ID statute that is probably about to become law, is that there are huge privately own commercial databases with enormous quantities of personal information about people. It appears that such companies intend to maintain the contents of such databases in perpetuity. Consequently the existence of people's old identification information will likely be maintained forever by commercial sources who will probably refuse to remove it. The commercial databases may be an even larger aspect of Big Brotherism, than the government's databases.
For example try performing various free queries at the following web site.
www.peoplefinders.com < http://www.peoplefinders.com/ >
Most people will be amazed at the wealth of "old" information about themselves they can find in such databases. The contents of the paid background checks is even more astounding. The government, social security, the IRS, the Department of Education, and so on, all keep a trail of old names and so on, all keyed to SSN, just as the credit reporting bureaus do. For example, even if a college changes such information for someone on request, it hasn't been changed by the U.S. Department of Education. Shouldn't people also be aware of and understand that their old information will remain in commercial and government databases, most likely forever, even though they request the original information sources to change it?
Other interesting and helpful sites
Transgender
Legal History compiled by Katrina Rose
This is an outstanding collection of legal precedents listed by state, including
many state precedents for name change.
Instructions by state
Instructions by Canadian province
If you were born in Quebec and live in another Canadian province, you may find it easier to change your name in Quebec. See the Quebec page for more.
Instructions outside North America
|
