Show BIRTH registration the establishment of community records such auch as those resulting from the registration of births is one of the first evidences that a community experts to have ave some degree ot oc permanency and that the inhabitants do not consider themselves as temporary residents this was as true of the greek and roman civilizations as of our own the necessity for the registration of births is felt in many of the actie aties of the modern state or city the uses of registration are legal and social it also may serve an important function in public health administration legal and social uses the registration of a childs birth forms a legal record that is frequently useful and may he be of the greatest importance it establishes the date of birth bir th and the childs parentage it maybe may be required to establish the childs age for attendance at public schools or for permission to work in states where restrictions are placed upon child labor to show in courts of law whether a girl has reached the age of consent or whether individuals have attained the age when they may marry without the parents permission to establish age in connection with the granting of pensions military and jury duty and voting it may be important in connection with the bequeathing que athing and inheritance of property or to furnish acceptable evidence dence of genealogy identification papers for foreign travel and in fact may be important and useful in possible events too numerous to mention A duty to the child it is needless to say that the average american community composed of american fathers and mothers may properly be expected to be more zealous in the ithe care of its babies and then their welfare than in that of its cattle horses and dogs even though the animals be of pedigreed stock it is the custom to register the births of blooded animals that their parentage may be authenticated by carefully preserved records and not a mere matter of neighborhood memory or hearsay there are many more reasons why a babas parentage and rights should be safeguarded and protected by an official registration of its birth than there are for recording the birth and parentage of a colt or calf registration Regi station of its time and place of birth is a duty the community owes the child its future citizen A duty to the mother it is important to a mother that a proper record that will be fully accepted and unquestioned in courts of law shall be made of her childs birth and parentage this may be necessary to settle questions ef cf legitimacy and to determine the legal heirs to property necessary to an orderly and progressive gres sive community without official birth records i the rights of the individual indi vidal will be frequently jeopardized legal procedure will often be unnecessarily essa rily complicated child labor laws and school attendance will be impossible of enforcement there will be difficulty in determining ter whether those desiring to cast the ballot have reached the voting age and other difficulties fic unties too numerous to mention will arise then too birth records show the additions made to the population by natural increase cr ease and the elements of the population supplying this increase |