If CA doesn't trust notaries to notarize on the basis that the signer is well known to the notary, CA doesn't trust it's notaries period, and should just abolish the office of notary public.
If the state requires people to get notarizations to exercise their rights (right to travel, which indirectly requires a birth certificate, right to sell their real estate, etc.) and then deprives legitimate signers of the ability to obtain a notarization, then the state has violated the peoples right to travel, sell their real estate, etc.
CA unreasonably deprives those who have changed their name from obtaining notarizations by saying that if a person has ID on the acceptable list in one name, but not in the perfectly legitimate name they want to use on a certain document, they can't, because the credible witnesses are supposed to pay attention to the oath they would take, and the oath for credible witnesses say they can't agree to the oath if the person has ID on the acceptable list.
"Thank goodness, we're not required to accommodate their procrastination or other personal problems." Some ID problems are indeed due to procrastination. "Personal problems" could mean too many different things to address. I don't approve of procrastination, but procrastination should't mean someone becomes a non-person because, even though their identity is well-established, they haven't got things in just the form that CA notary law wants.
Also, notaries deal with signers from all over the world who are trying to meet requirements from multiple agencies, and pretty much all the agencies don't care about each other's rules and procedures. One state might refuse to put more than a middle initial on a driver license, or never put a suffix like Jr. on a name, and not give a **** that some newsletter from the CA SOS says it's a best practice to accept more on the ID than on the document, but not vice versa. The notary needs to have enough flexibility to notarize for well-identified signers without irrational catch-22s. |
