Name change procedure, legitimate interest, civil registrar officer, family name change, divorce, women's rights, name change law, Article 61 Civil Code, Cerfa declaration, civil status, surname change, identity change, name change bill, Patrick Vignal, Éric Dupont-Moretti, Justice Minister, National Assembly, surname regulation, filiation link, affective name change, child abandonment, name change associations, Carry my name, Marine Gatineau-Dupré, everyday life sufferings, legal revolution, civil code articles 60-61-4, surname history, identity intimacy, name change criticism, current name change procedure, simplified name change, declaration to civil registrar, French civil code, family law, name change rights
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Abstract
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Abstract
The French National Assembly debates a new bill on name change, simplifying the procedure to a declaration to the civil registrar officer, promoting equity in women's rights and reducing the complexity of the current process.
Extract
[...] II) The solution to the declaration to the civil registrar officer Thus, to address the issues raised by the current procedure, the Assembly questions a new name change procedure, orienting itself towards a declaration to the civil registrar officer. A. A legal revolution Since the appearance of the surname, the legislator has never stopped regulating the change of family name. Long forbidden, except for exceptional cases provided for by law, the change of name by declaration to the civil registrar office would be a legal revolution, as it would allow a gain of time and money for the applicants. [...]
[...] Requests for changes of family name have been flooding in for several years. In requests were submitted in in 2020, and 3,567 in 2021. B. A procedure regulated This change in procedure would thus allow divorced women, for example, to easily add the family name to that of their children with a simple declaration to the civil registrar office, thus allowing greater equity in the matter of women's rights. And this would also allow avoiding the humiliation that some denounce in more complex cases, in the case, for example, of the father's abandonment. [...]
[...] It will also discuss the massive increase in requests for name changes as well as the procedure to be followed. The question of the qualification of the civil status officer in the face of the complexity of certain requests will also be addressed. On the other hand, the arguments denouncing the non-malleability of civil status as well as the principle of non-mutability of surnames will not be dealt with here. Thus, the dissertation will address, in a first part, the current procedure for changing one's name in the face of criticism, and then, in a second part, the solutions that are proposed. [...]
[...] Should a name change be able to be done by simple declaration to the civil officer? A family name, 'it's an identity, an intimacy, a history, a memory and for a very large majority of us, we are happy and proud to bear this name. But there are people for whom this is more complicated, it can be a problem,' said Justice Minister Éric Dupond Moretti in the context of the new bill recently debated in the National Assembly, allowing for an easier change of family name once in a lifetime. [...]
[...] The notion of civil officer is established by Article L. 2122-32 of the General Code of Territorial Collectivities, which states that the mayor and his deputies are civil officers. The civil officer is responsible for receiving declarations and establishing civil status acts such as birth and death declarations. He also establishes marriage files and issues family books. The civil officer is responsible for the confidentiality and authenticity of the acts . The problem posed is whether a change of name should be possible by simple declaration to the civil status officer. [...]
