As the great Canadian philosopher, Geddy Lee once said, “conform or be cast out.” Francisco Mendez Vale is learning the wisdom of those words.
The Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles is refusing to issue Mendez a license under his true name because it doesn’t match the name on his birth certificate. The Lake Station man was born in Puerto Rico where the custom is often to name the child after both the father (Mendez) and the mother (Vale) but generally use only the father’s name. The use of only Mendez was good enough for the U.S. military and United States Steel, but by God, the Indiana BMV runs a tighter ship. Social Security records have Mr. Mendez as Francisco Mendez while the birth certificate is Francisco Mendez Vale. So, the Indiana BMV is requiring him to go to court and get his name changed to Francisco Mendez Vale before they’ll issue a driver’s license. I would presume this also interferes with Mr. Mendez exercising his right to vote.
Doug,
Would you please file an amicus brief with the Supreme Court of the United States on Mr. Mendez’s behalf? USA Today was going on today about how “neither side” has “any evidence” of “real-world problems” with individualized voter fraud or individualized disenfranchisement under this law.
Is it against ABA ethics for readers of your blog to raise money for the purpose of bribing Mr. Mendez to retain your services in this matter?
;-)
Yeah, probably. :-)
Funny, I always thought that Neil Pert was the one who penned the lyrics to Subdivisions. His only major solo contribution to the Rush discography.
I’d be a lot more interested in the opposition to the voter ID law if there were some deeper opposition to IDs and their too-common use in so many areas of life.
Without the voter ID law, I doubt there would be any interest from ACLU or the Dems about the petty resistance BMV is giving this man. Come to think of it, the article indicated nobody taking up his plight.
So, let’s see a little questioning of the premise of the ID, you know, so as to make the challenge to the voter ID law a little more believable.
Pert is the Ayn Rand disciple.
Dude, this happened to my wife. We had to blow $600 on a lawyer to get her name changed to what it’s been for the 11 years since we got married.
When we got married, she used her maiden name as her middle name (you know, like Hillary RHODHAM Clinton? Very unusal, huh?), which is not allowed under “the rules”.
Of course, that “rule” wasn’t a “rule” in New York or Illinois, where she has also had driver’s licenses in the last decade.
Since so much of her life is under the “incorrect” name (mortgages, bank accounts, social security card, etc.), we thought it best to go through the trouble of getting her name changed in a court of law.
Keep in mind that this all started because her passport expired. If she had used her passport and NOT her birth certificate, the BMV would never even had known that her maiden name was her middle name.
The Indiana Social Security offices have been slammed with people this last month whose ssn and driver’s license names do not match. I had to wait nearly an hour to see someone to take care of a legitimate concern. Trust me the people in the social security office are not happy about this one, either.
Tom,
Actually, Peart writes nearly all of Rush’s lyrics.
Take off, eh? :)
Thank goodness for the internet! Safe to say that I’ve learned something I didn’t know today. (even with my miserable typing-misspelling of Mr. Peart’s last name).
Thanks for the corrections all!
Tom,
You’ll find I’m full of all sorts of informaton, much of which is almost as useful as that.
Fear me! I will change your life with my command of minutia!
My wife also had to get a whole new set of documents recently. She was set to continue using her maiden name for professional continuity, but then we came to international travel situations. We realized that there would be times that our child (with my surname) would be alone with her (with her surname) and it could cause unnecessary problems. So, she got a new driver’s license and passport. No lawyer necessary (sorry, Doug!). Cost under $200.
In sum, every woman who marries and in any way deviates her name from the maiden name is up for this sort of inconvenience.
Again, I’d put a whole lot more faith in the Dem opposition to the voter ID law had they been challenging some of these long-standing ID issues. Heck, it would even satisfy the feminst constituency that generally tends to be Democrat. Alas. Crickets.