The Boston Globe reported that Massachusetts state records revealed that former Governor Mitt Romney opposed efforts by the Registry of Vital Records and Statistics to revise birth certificate forms for same-sex parents. The Registry of Vital Records made efforts to comply with Massachusetts's 2003 legalization of gay marriage law, but Governor Romney rejected the Registry's efforts because, he said , "The children of America have the right to have a father and a mother...What should be the ideal for raising a child? Not a village, not 'parent A' and 'parent B,' but a mother and a father."
The Registry's plan would allow the box labeled for "father" to be labeled as "father or second parent." Instead, Romney forced the Registry to obtain approval from his legal staff after "individually review[ing] the circumstances of every birth to same-sex parents." Once approval was obtained, "hospital officials and town clerks across the state [were] permited to cross out by hand the word 'father' on individual birth certificates, and then write in 'second parent,' in ink." Handwritten corrections on birth certificates was a violation of existing law.
It was only after Governor Deval Patrick assumed office that the appropriate changes were made to revise the birth certificate forms acknowledging children of same-sex marriages.
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