Access to Massachusetts Records Threatened Again
Bill H-3642: seeks to impose restrictions on electronic database and index access to vital records, as well as issuance of certified copies
Bill H-3643: closes the post-1910 birth and post-1950 marriage and death records (and the indices) to public access.
Bill H-3644: explains fees, funding and regulation extensions to the prior two bills.
If you're interested, you can also read the full text of existing Massachusetts law pertaining to vital records access.
Below is a press release from the Massachusetts Genealogical Council regarding the threat to records access, with steps that you can take to help stop these bills:
MGC urges all genealogists who care about access to vital records to act now!
Legislative bills (H-3642, H-3643, and H-3644, petitioned by Plymouth Rep. Thomas J. O’Brien, et al.), currently pending in the Massachusetts House Ways and Means Committee, are being pushed for passage within two weeks. They will close public records that have been open for nearly 400 years as well as the indexes to them.
We all must contact our Massachusetts state Representatives and Senators to oppose these three (O’Brien) bills for the following reasons:
- The bills call for restricting access to all birth records since 1915 and all marriage and death records since 1955.
- These records are currently open public records and are the entry point for genealogical and medical history research.
- Restricting public access to the indexes of these records is unprecedented. It will deny use by all non-governmental individuals: researchers in genealogy, medical history, probate heirs, banks, journalists, and historians.
Contact should be made immediately. We stopped these bills in 2003 – but now support for them in the legislature is formidable.
If YOU don’t speak now, these bills will change the face of genealogy in Massachusetts and beyond.
MOST EFFECTIVE: a signed letter with your reasons for opposing these closures, using your own words.
To view a sample letter for your legislators, click here.
ALSO: telephone calls, face to face meetings, and e-mails.
SHARE THIS ANNOUNCEMENT: urge your sympathetic relatives, friends, neighbors, and the professionals listed above to do the same.
Contact information for your representatives and senators is available at:
- http://www.mass.gov/legis/
- your town clerk
- the state house at (617) 722-2000
- the postal address is: Representative (or Senator) _______, State House, Room _______, Boston, MA 02133.
If you have any questions, please respond to Sharon Sergeant, MGC Director of Programs, and member of the MGC Civil Records Committee or visit our website at www.massgencouncil.org.
How do you feel about public access to current vital records? As a genealogist, we all want them available for research, but when you think about the fact that it includes access to your birth record, or those of your parents, does it make you feel any different? Click on "comments" below to share how you feel.
Comments
with the stealing of identies it would seem reasonable. But for us who are poorer and trying to trace our family trees it will be devestating. Let’s be reasonable. there must be another way?
With alot of people never knowing where their families came from it would be a great disservice to them not to be able to investigate all records to trace their genealogy. I agree there has to be another way.
Another example of how out of touch the Massachusetts Legislature is …
I’ve heard the bill is sponsored by city and town clerks who do not want to answers the public’s questions about these public records.
Figures, people who know nothing about genealogy making rules to stiffle family access to needed historical records.
If any other state had done this I would say what a bunch of uninformed souls. For Mass. to do it is beyond my comprehension.
Elected officials, does this mean school children will not be able to research the family of Abraham Lincoln?
Get real!
U. S. Citizen
Perhaps I just have an indignant bone that gets tweaked every time I hear about secrecy concerning records. Or maybe it’s because I was adopted and just recently (in my 40’s) found out who gave birth to me. But this ticks me off, and I’m no where close to MA so it has nothing to do with state loyalty.
At the very LEAST, birth, death and marriage records should be available to the public. We in the U.S. are in a unique position, but we’re not alone in it; in many countries a family heritage can be traced back for a very long time. But with us being immigrants, names were changed for various reasons and good records weren’t kept, although they tried. My g-g’father and his predecessors could conceiveably have come from at least 8 countries. His name is definitely German, but it’s also definitely Scottish, and I’ve seen references to other countries as well.
Making it even more difficult than it already is to get records we have a birthright to is sad and outrageous. Maybe if we, individually, had and were encouraged to have more pride in our past, we wouldn’t have such a bleak future as a group.
SINCE (the key word here) 1915. This may be based on the 100 year “rule of thumb” used in many government systems to protect the living and for several reasons including identity theft! Now who would want to claim being 99 years old and married to some retched old man with a Rail Roader’s pension? - you’d be surprised who and how this information can be used and on various levels - I know all too well from a military related article sent to me by a lister and first hand from being a medical professional- here in the USA we now must abide to the federal act HIPPA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) which means we cannot tell you why or what hospital your father was sent to if you are not listed as the responsible party but I can tell your sister who has the power of attorney.
With similar gains throughout the world, life expectancy at birth in the United States in 1901 was 49 years. At the end of the century it was 77 years, an increase of 57%. which is largely attributed to the eradication and control of numerous infectious diseases and to non-sustainable advances in agricultural technology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy
Along with other interesting facts such as surname distribution, the Life expectancy for a particular surname can be found on Ancestry.com http://www.ancestry.com/learn/facts/default.aspx
The non disclosure of birth and marriage records is discouraging news for genealogist whose intention is simply to gather B/MD information to build a family tree. It is especially problematic for those who are orphans seeking information about their biological parents (esp. important if health information is needed) but there are provisions to work around this, such as signed and notarized request for the release of such information. I have a 97 page handwritten book recording births, marriages and deaths from 1786 onward until its completion in 1976 by an elderly family historian without the aid of a computer and with much of the information gathered from newspapers, court records and most importantly, from other family members. And so with an “ancestor” who falls within the 100 year range, it is likely that someone living can relate the more “recent” information on a personal level. The best place to start, if possible, is by asking those living and if elderly, hope that their memory is still intact.
A distant relative can sometimes provide the missing pieces…….
There are obituaries (if you know the location of death the search will narrow dramatically).
http://oa.newsbank.com/oa-search/we/Archives?p_field_OBIT
Social Security was started in the USA in 1935, and there is an interactive search index for persons, on Rootsweb, however, if survivors did not report the death to the Soc Sec Administration, or if the individual died before the records were computerized (in 1962) then they may not appear in this database. http://ssdi.rootsweb.com/
Death certificates in both the USA and Ireland will have the name of the person (often a relative) who provided the information about the deceased ie name, birth date, where they were born. The cutoff dates for accessing these certificates varies by the office where it is held. I had no problem obtaining copies of birth and death certificates past the dates you mention from the state health dept - all that was required was the name of the person, their birth, mother’s maiden name, father’s name and or full name and death date (which may be obtained from Soc. Sec.), my relationship to them and the reason I wanted this information. In one case, it was to obtain an official copy of a birth cert to obtain a passport for a minor - http://www.vitalchek.com/?clicked=1 What I got via vital check order over the computer and sent Fed ex was an official copy of a birth certificate giving the sex of the child as MAIL - now I ask is this “legal”? LOL
It is unfortunate that fraud is committed everyday by those who gather enough information to obtain or create false IDs, with a mothers maiden name (a security question) obtain credit cards and of course computer hacking, a problem of this generation, requiring increased security measures. It is a shame that a few who have less than honorable intentions have ruined it for us all.
Moreover, our own government offices have a full load with immigration and Katrina victims who have lost all - including legal identification, leaving them with little time for a genealogist to prove their relationship to Aunt Sally who died in 1958 so that they can view her records.
I understand the need for genealogical research, however, the protection of our personal information must come first, particularly that of children. Children are increasingly the target of ID theft precisely because of the easy access to their personal and identifying documents. It can be years before this fraud is identified.
Also it is NOT unprecedented- Masschusetts is one of only 13 states with completely unfettered access to vital records. Massachusetts is far, far behind the times when it come to protecting its in-state born residents.
I have no issue with researchers viewing documents, but no one but the individual of record and his/her parents (or guardian) and immediate family relations should be able to actually obtain a record. Further, if Massachusetts is not going to restrict access then custodians of records should be keeping records of who requests to view and/or obtain records (name, address, picture Id required and copied) and the individual of record or that person’s family should be notified. The greater good here is protecting the individuals of records.
As a parent of a child whose personal information was inappropriately obtained, I take this matter very seriously and strongly support measures to curtail access - much like California, New York, and most other states in this country.
I have yet to hear a compelling argument as to why just anyone should be able to walk into city hall or the state vital statistics office and obtain my record and that of my children simply for the asking and payment of a fee. If we can protect the records of individuals born to unmarried parents, then we should protect all records or at least give parents the right to impound their child’s record regardless of marital status.