most of us truly never need them. last time mine was needed for anything was when I was 16 getting my driver's license. since then, my license and social security card have been all I've needed to prove identity and citizenship
Size of the country, lack of resources to pull from, lack of money to pay to get copies, etc etc.
My mom was born in a very small rural town in Texas; she would need to travel all the way down there to get access to her birth certificated from over 60 years ago.
apologies is everything still paper form/not online - is that what you mean by copies and having to drive somewhere to get something. Not sure what the size of the country has to do with getting a passport - is it just expensive and paper based the first time. Its worth it though.
Certified paper copies printed on security paper are needed to obtain US Passports. They can be ordered online, but the process can be significantly longer than just going into a county clerk's office and getting one in person - which is why I mentioned size of the country.
There are many rural towns, defunct military bases, and areas that have been destroyed by natural disasters, where such documents don't exist anymore. Many people don't have the time or money to go and do all of this - especially when our state IDs were enough to register for the longest time.
With the mass firings of government workers (thanks to M*sk) and other such nonsense that’s been going on, I don’t foresee a positive outcome for a lot of people—particularly the elderly.
Access to birth certificates is usually pretty easy - but the name has to match your current photo-ID name, which is not the case for many people, and the law doesn’t appear to allow the usual solution of birth-certificate + name-change document
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My mom was born in a very small rural town in Texas; she would need to travel all the way down there to get access to her birth certificated from over 60 years ago.
It's unrealistic atp.