Sometimes it’s the small abuses scurrying below radar that reveal how profoundly the Bush administration has changed America in the name of national security. Buried within the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 is a regulation that bars most public access to birth and death certificates for 70 to 100 years. In much of the country, these records… return to article
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Reader Comments (23)Page 1 of 1 pagesIt’s nearly always a good idea to ask yourself, “Why?” before getting your skivies in a knot about any issue.
There is usually more than one possible answer.
One of the best ways to change your identity (read steal I.D.) is to begin with a birth certificate. Next go for a Social Security number, and so on…
There obviously needs to be a method for appropriate agencies (and to identify the actual individual) to access this info, but not all the “public” should be able.
Posted by whattheheck on Feb 9, 2006 at 9:26 AM I gotta agree with you on that whattheheck....I’m sorry but I will not shed a tear that the press is unable to check out my records or some random public official in the name of their special investigation.
Posted by csmelnix on Feb 9, 2006 at 5:38 PM Allowing nutcases like the bush people to control access to the populations’ vital statistics is a step closer to their ability to identify any and everybody they want to isolate as “terrorist”.
As far as media access to vital information, some outlets will have full access while others won’t. I’m sure most writers published by ITT are in the “won’t” column.
ITT has given us fair warning, its time to vacate the U S.
Posted by theloneous on Feb 10, 2006 at 2:11 PM As a genealogist, I am concerned about records closures and loss of access to records. I would urge you to use your reportorial skills to publicize this issue further. However, I am not sure if any one person bears the brunt of the blame. At this time I am very concerned about NJ Assembly Bill 1390 which would close all vital records and make it a crime to share vital record information. This would effectively prevent anyone from researching their New Jersey family roots. This bill is sponsored by three Democrats, Quigley, Hackett and Pou. So do not think it is only Republicans who want to close the government to citizens. Much of the excuse for these records closures is attributed to a September 2000 Office of Inspector General report on Birth Certificate Fraud, as part of the federal government’s ongoing effort to close public records to citizens. This report was not issued under President Bush. Do not let your hatred of one person blind you to the on-going trend of big government, under any administration, which is hostile to the interests of freedom for citizens. This report does not provide any documentation for its claims and does not identify any studies that support its records closure recommendations.
Posted by Holly Kilpatrick on Feb 11, 2006 at 7:56 AM Perhaps the most damaging information out there in the ether is the Social Security number. When I signed up with Veterans’ Affairs to get my prescriptions I found out that Army serial numbers have been replaced by Soc. Sec. For anyone now severing they are one in the same.
This is the single most desirable info for anyone wanting to rip you off.
Posted by whattheheck on Feb 12, 2006 at 7:26 AM Information is being methodically and systematically withheld from the public, with the complicity of the mainstream media. That’s a given.
What’s not as apparent is the enormous danger of such ignorance.
Not to miss:
Required Reading for Bush Backers....and expose of NeoConservatism.
http://tvnewslies.org/html/the_truth_about_george_w__bush.html
Posted by skipper7 on Feb 16, 2006 at 12:46 PM Dead people have been voting in various locales for many years, Paperless, unverifiable voting machines are being pushed by a needed reform gone awry. Voter requirements are being tightened- non-drivers will have a hard time voting. Hmm. I agree asking the question “Why” is important. Why does the federal government need to collect and hold this information so closely?
The genetic component of diseases is of growing importance. Will adoptees ever be able to find their real parents and why they died? Some people may be consigned to horribly painful and short lives by breeding. Without outside scrutiny will some families or groups be subject to medical discrimination in insurance or hiring because of high potential medical risks? Epidemiology has the potential to be set back considerably.
Whose information is it anyway? Individuals and familly members? Or the federal government’s? There are lots of questions to ask and monlithic government, regardless who dominates it, is almost never the answer.
Why are we willing to give up rights of personal privacy and knowledge to the federal government? So we can use credit cards more freely? I have a hard time believing that identity theft requires such a Draconian solution.
States sell driver license and automobile licensing information to businesses. Wouldn’t that be a better loophole to close first?
South America has a tradition of “disappearing” dissidents. Could people disappear in the USA? Seventy years from now who would even know to ask? I’m afraid I have seen things in the past few years that I never thought could happen here, happen in spades.
I’m afraid I would like to see the current messy hodge podge with the few checks and balances we have remain intact.
Doesn’t this step require more debate than it has received?
Posted by Sroberts on Feb 18, 2006 at 2:02 AM All good points, Stroberts. Whose information is it. Government officials will always feel that the data they manage is theirs. In genealogy research we see this all the time, low-level government workers who will not release information in city halls and county registrars offices, etc, even at times when it is legal. The restrictions discussed in this article, related to the Patriot Act, are not yet law. But in many states across the land, including New York and threatening to be in New Jersey, vital records are already restricted from the people. Just do a google search on vital records and genealogy and you will see the loss of freedoms already in place on a state level, and some of the state officials are salivating at the prospect of being able to extend these restrictions further. A newspaper in Scranton, PA sent out reporters on a sort of scavenger hunt, to municipal buildings and police departments all across the state, to request various documents that are explicitly open to the general public in PA. They did not say they were reporters. A high percentage were denied to them. Officials are on record saying, after they found out the results, that they wouldn’t give out such-and-such information even it is open to the public! If you are concerned about this issue, write to the three Democrat Assemblywomen in NJ who wrote Bill 1390 to close the NJ records, Quigley, Pou and Hackett.
Posted by Holly Kilpatrick on Feb 18, 2006 at 5:43 AM Secrecy is always an essential ingredient of a surveillance State, I think. Amongst other reasons: the value of information attained is thereby multiplied. The examples you site are hardly small, however. Please keep talking.
For a “small” example, let me mention the State of Minnesota, which now restricts driving and accident information which until recently was fully public. The clerks who are charged with the job of NOT sharing this information will likely tell you it’s because it is “private.”
No such thing! Privacy is a dead duck in today’s surveillance society. Rather, information is “restricted” i.e. secret. Depending on whether the government likes you or not, it may share some of these secrets with you. The government of the State of Minnesota, now a wholly owned subsidiary of the Tax Whiners’ League, likes insurance companies. It doesn’t like its citizens, and they are required to get a lawyer if they want access to much of this information. No kidding.
In the place of privacy which once might have been an argument for protecting information have come the realities of a surveillance-secrecy world in which the State may watch its no-longer “private” citizens at any time and acquire any information it chooses about them, much of it secretly done. And then the other shoe drops and it may restrict and dole out and use that information in any way it chooses.
The decades-long assault on privacy and all civil liberties has been a rather “public” enterprise, justified by shifting hysterias: currently our rampant immorality, illegal immigration, the so-called “War (yet another!) on terror,” and whatever. In many ways it has been the front line of the domestic war on democracy. Meanwhile secrecy has long been justified as part of foreign policy and sometimes even limited to that sphere. Domestic secrecy is rather sneaking in the back door. Secretly.
The many citizens who have supported the secrecy of lies, the corruption, the torture, the abuse, the illegality in Iraq,—to the extent of denouncing the exposure of those secrets, rather than the lies and abuse,—are probably right about one thing. THEY are not likely to be as abused.
But I would suggest that the average citizens of any totalitarian state feel their tyranny more in the accumulation of day to day “small” inconveniences and secrets and State controls and intrusions into their lives than they do in the larger events such as torture, imprisonment, punishment for speech and political activity. After all such citizens are inherently blackmailed into acquiescence and silence and far too cowed to risk rebellion.
And when they are abused, how would we know? It’s a State Secret.
Anon
(Think about that!)
Posted by anon on Feb 19, 2006 at 4:40 PM Holly -
I share your concern about blocking access to birth and death certificates. I’m an amateur genealogist and my research would come to a standstill without these documents.
Posted by Peg on Feb 19, 2006 at 5:05 PM I find it interesting that this author does not post a link to the draft of the proposed regulations, or indicate who precisely is sponsoring this particular act (and or this part of it). I’m always leery of where authors of particularly partisian pieces get their information from and how distorted or spun it might be for the sake of that person’s agenda. I agree the implications of this provision could be problematic for many people or organizations, but I’m also wondering what I’m NOT being told about this matter by this author.
Posted by Maskless on Feb 21, 2006 at 10:29 AM Here is a link to information about the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004:
http://www.ssa.gov/legislation/legis_bulletin_010705.html
Posted by Holly Kilpatrick on Feb 21, 2006 at 4:59 PM The issue of closing public records is very complex and far reaching. In terms of vital records, the concern must include an individual’s ease in accessing his or her own information. Limiting access to birth and death certificates is tied, in no small part, to the Real ID Act and to Voter Identification requirements of the Help America Vote Act. Both of those provisions were not discussed by the people, or even the representatives of the people. The legislation was added after conference committee.
As for security, the more centralized information is, the easier it is to steal and harder to correct. Ask anyone who has had their identity stolen, either by government or by private citizen. It costs hundreds and even thousands of dollars and can take years to re-prove one’s own identity to governmental and financial institutions. Yet, with some ingenuity, people can lose their identities quickly, and all the records required to re-prove one’s own identity are not even touched by the criminals.
I tried to access air pollution data from the EPA in the late 1990’s and was told the information was no longer updated regularly due to security concerns. Yet, with the 2000 U.S. Census, information was provided in such detailed breakouts that news accounts were being written about the relative ease with which people could identify individuals through so-called co-mingled data. There also is the concern of public data being restricted to free public usage so that private companies can package and sell the data.
Posted by SillyLeftist on Feb 21, 2006 at 7:58 PM The only commodity that this country still produces in any great quantity is information. I feel that it is a shame that records like birth and death records are now restricted. Secrecy and accountability are opposite ends of the spectrum. In my opinion we have a government that does not with to be accountable to anyone and that is a major worry.
We seem to want to blame everything on 9-11, but this problem started before that. We as citizens don’t take to time to hold our government accountable. We don’t keep up on the FACTS, rather we opt for a quick 30 second sound bite from our favorite source. We as a country have a deficit of critical thinkers, people who look at the whole story not just a quick biased glimpse.
We’ve got to stop being too busy to watch our government.
Posted by kcwookie on Feb 22, 2006 at 2:45 PM If you have a draft of the proposed regulations why don’t you post them?
Tamara
http://pibuzz.com
Posted by pibuzz on Feb 23, 2006 at 12:42 PM Tamara: Holly Kilpatrick above already posted this link—
http://www.ssa.gov/legislation/legis_bulletin_010705.htmlAll you need to do is copy and paste in your browser window. That’s not too much to ask, is it?
Posted by stellans on Feb 23, 2006 at 2:10 PM The link that Holly posted goes to the SSA bulletin not the draft regulations referred to by Terry. HHS is supposed to release proposed regulations that flesh out the details related to access to vital records. I haven’t seen any proposal that recommends closure of access to county based birth and death records for genealogical copies. I know that the trend in state and local governments is toward more restriction. I’m just looking for something the feds are proposing that spells this out.
Tamara
http://pibuzz.com
Posted by pibuzz on Feb 23, 2006 at 2:41 PM Open records have always been a mainstay of the freedoms and responsibilities of citizens of this country. Once we lose our rights to open records, they will never be returned to us.
One example of how taking away our rights to open records will hurt us - I am working on a probate case trying to identify “missing” family members who are entitled to an inheritance from a distant relative. Under these new laws, no one including the attorney appointed by the court to represent these missing heirs, will be able to research the records necessary to trace the lineages and find the family members. We’re talking people born in the 1800s and who died in the 1900s, hardly fodder for terrorists or someone wanting to score a credit card.
People who commit credit theft and terrorists do not go to county court houses or health departments and walk under several cameras and past several armed guards and present photo IDs and sign request forms to obtain birth certificates or death certificates.
Studies conducted by the banking and credit industry show that credit theft occurs most often from such mundane acts as stolen mail, financial records that were thrown away and not shredded, clerks who steal info during a transaction, “phishing” or what we used to call plain old con-jobs, whether done on the internet or telephone or face-to-face, etc.
Yes, we need to protect our country from those who wish to do us harm and we need to protect ourselves from those who would illegally use our credit information. But we need solutions that address the real problems, not chicken-little-the-sky-is-falling-let’s-all-let-big-brother-take-away-our- -freedoms-so-we-think-we’ll-be-safe. Passing a law that no one can see my Granny’s 1904 birth certificate or her 1981 death certificate is not going to stop any terrorist or credit thief from doing their thing.
And while attempts are being made to take away the rights of citizens to obtain public information, the government actually supports big businesses that collect all kinds of information on us and distributes that info to others without our permission. Anyone checked out INTELIUS on the internet lately? Or how about that backrgound check authorization you signed for an app for a new job? Did it give some big company the right to collect any info on you that it wanted and then share that info with not only this employer but also ANY of that data collection company’s subscribers in the future?
Posted by deedeeking on Feb 23, 2006 at 3:21 PM This is a fascinating thread. Very complex. Must get back to it tomorrow. All kinds of issues here.
WTH, I believe Reagan made the changes to government processing of paper work so that it was not exactly required for a citizen to give their social security number, but the government wouldn’t process the form if one didn’t cough up the number.
I memorized my social security number in boot camp, and still say it and think it with the cadence that I called it out when asked. I usually silently add “sir” after saying the number so that I don’t feel like I didn’t complete the action. There’s training for you.
Posted by wileywitch on Feb 27, 2006 at 10:32 PM Re : GENEALOGY SEARCH
I would like to find out any information about the descendents of families NAUM TOPALI and his wife EFTALIA, that lived in Korce,ALBANIA, and moved in the 1900-1930’s in U.S.A(Boston) and ROMANIA (Bucharest).
My grand-fathers and their possible 5 descendents are:1.NAUM TOPALI
-born:aprox.1850:KORCE,ALBANIA
-death:before 1909:KORCE,ALBANIA2.EFTALIA TOPALI
-born:aprox.1860:KORCE,ALBANIA
-death:after 1909(maybe 1930-1940):KORCE,ALBANIADESCENDENTS:
1.ATHENA(ATINA)TOPALI:born in 1888,established in ROMANIA(BUCHAREST),married with IANE CRISTACHE,and died in 1960.
2.EVRIDICHI TOPALI,born in maybe 1890-died in maybe 1970, established in ROMANIA,married with NICOLITZARU.
3. ?...TOPALI,born in maybe 1895-died in maybe 1975,married with BOROVA,and remained in KORCE,ALBANIA,having as son BOROVA PANDELE.
4. ?.. TOPALI,born maybe in 1883-1888,married, established in USA- BOSTON MA or in KINGS NY,and died maybe in 1965-1985.
5. ?..TOPALI,born maybe in 1940-1945,established in USA, BOSTON MA or PHOENIX AZ.
. I try to find my relatives that came to America and that arrived initially in BOSTON,MA and then spread in other states from the U.S.For this reason I have posted announcements on some boards,and I dared to ask for help at some persons that know how to search some public information.I am interested in the history of the TOPALI family and especially the situation of the descendents from USA that are still alive,and i would like to know the names,ages,childrens,adresses,etc.
e-mail : gnirolf@yahoo.com
Posted by rolf on Mar 1, 2006 at 12:23 AM I want to find out whether my grandfather was really a bigamist.
Posted by wileywitch on Mar 1, 2006 at 12:41 PM The abuse is the availability and publication of my birth information, life records and family information. In Connecticut we have long held that birth records less than 100 years old are unavilable to anyone except the individual, the decendent or parents. I cannot even view records unless I belong to an approved genealogical society. Now an organization, Ancestry.com, is publishing my individual birth, marriage, and family records of living people because they want to. The information being collected and published is not for some greater good. It is for the almighty dollar. I am more concerned that someone in the government is selling my information. The Patriot Act scares me, because I have lost rights my ancestors died for to protect. The Bush administration is actually protecting us from Big Business on this one.
Posted by cuzmuz on Mar 5, 2006 at 4:28 PM Page 1 of 1 pages -
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