Can I legally include a line break in my child's name?

Question

Ethics aside, is it legal (or even possible) to include a line break (newline) in my child's name? Preferably at the end of the child's first name, directly after the last letter. So instead of (for example) the name "John Doe", the name would always be written out "John
Doe". And then when the first name only is written out the line break would have to be included, such as "My child's first name is John
and his last name is Doe". If this is legal, how would I go about making sure the line break is included on the name section of the birth certificate?

Answer 1

In the US, any legal restrictions on names are implemented at the state level——although broad administrative restrictions exist on the federal level. Some states may restrict use of diacritics (ubiquitous in Vietnamese) or Arabic numerals (but not Roman numerals). At the other extreme, in Washington state, there is no requirement to include a name at all in the case of live birth of known parentage. In the case of delayed report of live birth, and "An individual requesting the delayed report of live birth of an individual under twelve years of age must establish the facts concerning full name, date, and place of live birth". But no restrictions are imposed on names that can be so reported.

Theoretically, one could attempt to register a child with the name 𑠓𑠳𑠢 (in the Dogra script), which would cause technical problems for the registrar's office. It is likely that the clerk taking in the form would respond something along the lines of "Huh?" and "How do you spell that". Similarly, one might try to register a birth name Hoàng Phủ Ngọc Tường, which would not be particularly difficult to deal with but might still stress the system (it depends on the county). In the latter case the name might be quietly converted to Hoang Phu Ngoc Tuong. In the former case, it is virtually guaranteed that the clerk would have no recourse but to insist on a romanization. Then the person registering would be insistent, they would file a lawsuit, and the courts would make some decision. It is most likely that the courts would be sympathetic to the practical concerns of the registrar and would not demand a huge overhaul of computer systems to allow any arbitrary graphic representation as a legal name.

The State Department has regulations regarding names at 8 FAM 403: Personally Identifying Information. 8 FAM 403.1-3(C) addresses punctuation, special characters and symbols, diacritical marks, and non-Latin alphabets. They do not prohibit anything in names, instead they acknowledge that not everything is supported, and there is a long discussion of "discrepancies" which would explain the passport name "Nyema" for 𑠓𑠳𑠢. Passport names comply with the International Civil Aviation Organization standard. Social Security has a different set of rules where spaces, numbers, hyphens, slashes or any other special characters are not allowed for names, even including length limits where first, middle and last names can be maximally 10, 7 and 13 characters long (enter the first 10, 7 and 13 characters).

Answer 2

Can I legally include a line break in my child's name?

Let's rephrase that:

1. Can I legally register my child's name in bold/italic/underlined/strike-through?
2. Can I legally register my child's name in a specific color?
3. Can I legally register my child's name in blinking text?
4. Can I legally register my child's name with a spoiler cover?

More generally:

• Is text formatting a feature of a person name?

I'm sure it is not, and you probably will conclude too it's not.

Simple reason: how to format the text name of a person when speaking? Could I file a lawsuit if my teacher doesn't speak my name in italic when checking student presence?

P.S.: stick to letters present in your language's alphabet. If it's not there, it's just a typograhical or other technological convention, not a valid letter.

Answer 3

Not in germany

In general, you can name your kid how you want, but there are limits in practice, due to technical and legal constraints.

Germany has a list of allowed characters in names because the Bundesdruckerei does not support every character. Format characters are not on the list, as are many other non letter characters, such as brackets. Neither is þ (thorn), which is still in use as a typical character in Icelandic and would be transliterated into th. Even typical Danish alphabet extensions are not available.

On top of that, German officials can deny names to be put on the birth certificate if they are made up, can't be properly expressed, or in other way or form would negatively impact the child. An example would be a clear negative connotation. How strict are they? Well, depends on the name and clear ideology: You can not ever name your kid Satan, Stalin, or Lenin and you might trigger the block with Adolf, but you won't get scrutiny if name your kid Adolphus. Oh, and you are limited to 5 first names, of which at most pairs can be combined with a hyphen.

However, even old names can get this treatment. Among the people I know, the father of an Oke had to prove that it was a typical Friesian name, and the parents of a Merlin were urged to add a second name.

Not in japan

The 戸籍法 (Family Register Act) contains this paragraph:

第五十条子の名には、常用平易な文字を用いなければならない。
Article 50(1)For the given name of a child, characters that are simple and in common use shall be used.

２常用平易な文字の範囲は、法務省令でこれを定める。
(2)The scope of characters that are simple and in common use shall be defined by Ordinance of the Ministry of Justice.

The list of characters on the Ordinance is Hiragana, Katakana, common Kanji, and a list of uncommon ones. None of them is a linebreak, or a Latin character (Romaji), or an Indian number.

Consolation prize: Numerals in Japanese script are available for naming, and are actually somewhat common. For example, Ichigo with the "ichi" written as 一 is literally "first ..." and some of those are rather common names, especially the combinations meaning "first child."

Answer 4

Not in iceland

Iceland has an explicit list of approved given names. If a child’s prospective name is on that list, then it’s fine. If it’s not on that list, then it needs to be approved by the Mannanafnanefnd (generally called the ‘Icelandic Naming Committee’ in English). Actually being approved has a couple of concrete requirements:

• It can only contain letters in the Icelandic alphabet (A, Á, B, D, Ð, E, É, F, G, H, I, Í, J, K, L, M, N, O, Ó, P, R, S, T, U, Ú, V, X, Y, Ý, Þ, Æ, and Ö).
• It has to be possible to decline it as a noun in the Icelandic language’s grammatical case system. This is a requirement because Iceland still uses patronymic and matronymic surnames instead of family names like most of the rest of the Western world does, which means that it must be possible to form a genitive form of a name (so that it can then be used as the first part of the patronymic or matronymic name of any future children).
• In practice because of the above two constraints, it usually has to follow Icelandic phonotactics (that is, combinations of sounds that are not valid in Icelandic are typically not allowed).
• Prior to 2019, the name’s grammatical gender had to match the physiological gender of the individual.

Additionally, the Mannanafnanefnd has to accept that the name is ‘compatible with Icelandic tradition’ (yes, it’s really that vague in the laws surrounding this), and is not likely to cause the bearer embarrassment (so, for example, something such as Rassinn would not be likely to be accepted).

Answer 5

Not in canada

I assume you are asking whether it is legal or possible to include a line break character in the name used in the state administrative records referring to your child, since I am not aware of any restrictions on what you call your child or how you represent your child's name in your own writing. Here are some restrictions from around Canada.

manitoba

Vital Statistics Act:

the given name and the surname must consist only of the letters "a" to "z" and accents from the English or French languages, but may include hyphens and apostrophes

british-columbia

Birth Registration (appears to be a practical, not legal constraint):

Names must use Latin alphabetic letters, and can contain apostrophes, hyphens, a period, and a standard set of French accents. Numbers, brackets (), slashes / or other symbols are not accepted.

alberta

Restrictions respecting personal names (it is not clear whether these are practical or legal restrictions):

All given and last names must begin with a letter and may contain non-consecutive hyphens, apostrophes and periods. The name must use the standard English alphabet of 26 letters.

Some punctuation marks are allowed, but "A legal name cannot contain just hyphens, periods or apostrophes without letters such as ('..-..')". Some accented characters can also be printed.

Vital Statistics Act: The Registrar has discretion to refuse to register a name that in the Registrar's opinion might reasonably be expected to cause confusion.

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An aside. I think we all understood this question clearly, and it's been a fun research adventure! But I would avoid the framing about whether people's "names" are legal. None of this regulates names as such. It regulates what you can have the state to record and refer to you as. It regulates one's "legal" name—one's administrative name. I think this is an important distinction because calling one's name "illegal" can minimize one's identity. And highlighting the distinction between one's name and the name recognized by the government can help push the government to expand their capacity to different forms of names.

Answer 6

Not in france

The glyphs of a first name must be part of the French alphabet. The new line character/sequence is not part of it.

I did not find anything for the family name but I believe that in doubt it would follow the rules for the first name.

Answer 7

Probably not in sweden and israel

According to the Naming law in Sweden Wikipedia article:

The first paragraph does not give a person the right to acquire as a first name a name that can cause offence, can be assumed to lead to discomfort for the person who will bear the name, or is for some other reason unsuitable as a first name.

For example "Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssqlbb11116" was not approved as a name.

Israel has a similar law regarding names.

Answer 8

england-and-wales

This FOI request outlines the relatively permissive regime that governs the registering of baby names, but your chosen name would not be allowed as it is not a "sequence of letters".

Registrations of births in England and Wales are made under the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953 and the Registration of Births and Deaths Regulations 1987. The legislation does not set out any guidance on what parents may name their child.

Our advice to registrars is that a name should consist of a sequence of letters and that it should not be offensive. The reason for limiting the registration of names to a sequence of letters is that a name which includes a string of numbers or symbols etc. has no intrinsic sense of being a name, however the suffix 'II' or 'III' would be allowed.

The only restriction on the length of a name is that it must be able to fit in the space provided on the registration page.

There are no leaflets or booklets available giving guidance on this matter. Where the registrar has any concerns over a name they will discuss this with the parents and point out the problems the child may face as they grow up and try to get them to reconsider their choice.

We have not had occasion to refuse to register a name.

In practice, the registrar would advise you that this name wouldn't be allowed and try to dissuade you from giving your offspring a stupid name, noting that none of the following characters appear in any UK registration on record;

Following a search of the data I can confirm that none of the relevant characters appear in the names published in the above releases.

Answer 9

TL;DR

Don't do this to your child. I feel like CPS could file an abuse report against you for the hardship you'd cause.

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Setting aside both ethics and legality you are merely inquiring about the capabilities of computer systems.

Odds are sky-high that the field where the name gets entered is just a single-line text field which does not support newlines; by design.

Even if you could miraculously register the newline control character in your child's name it will simply trigger a life of hardship in every single web form which has to be filled out.

See https://jsfiddle.net/o1zthnwy/

Answer 10

There is a reigning characteristic amongst the existing answers that they all start from the idea that the person registering the name has the right to specify the name authoritatively in writing.

In fact, the authoritative specification of a name historically was the verbal form. A person's "name" is how they are called and to what call they respond.

The name registered in birth rolls is how the parents call the child and refer to it amongst the family and community (albeit there would not yet be response from the baby itself).

It is the registrar who is ultimately responsible for deciding how the written form translates from the specified verbal form, and for making the entry into the rolls accordingly. If they cannot coherently hear the name, or translate it into writing, they will not make an entry.

Whilst the registrar isn't likely to quibble with any plausible spelling offered to accompany a verbalised name, when it comes to things like a "line break", they would simply ask "how do you say that?" and "how do you spell that?".

Since the relevant concept has no sounding - it's a typesetting/type layout concept - it is by definition not part of any name by which a person is (or may be) called.

As it is not part of any name and cannot be spoken, it would simply not fall to be entered into the rolls by the registrar.

You could of course give the child a middle name like "Bobby Line Break Tables", but the name then consists of the words "Line Break" - the written form of the name does not however incorporate any line break.