TL; DR: Look for other explanations
Lately, there has been a lot of ink…or pixels dedicated to Meghan, Duchess of Sussex and her husband, The Artist Formerly Known as Prince Harry. For some, it looks like an obsession. In “Meghan Markle Officially Dropped Her Royal Title on Lili’s Birth Certificate Amid Her Drama With Harry’s Family“ Jason Pham noticed that the Duchess didn’t use her current title on Lilibet Mountbatten-Windsor’s birth certificate. Did Duchess Meghan really ditch her title? Let’s dig deeper:
The Claim: Duchess Meghan officially dropped her royal name
Though the descriptions are different, both Lili and Archie’s birth certificates listed as “His Royal Highness” and “Duke of Sussex.” But what about Meghan? For Archie’s birth certificate, Meghan is listed as his mother by both her royal titles as “Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Sussex.” However, for Lili’s birth certificate, Meghan seemed to officially drop her royal title and list herself by her birth name as “Rachel Meghan Markle.”
Though Harry and Meghan agreed to no longer use their “HRH” titles, the couple confirmed that they’ll still be referred to as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Meghan is credited as Duchess of Sussex for her and Harry’s non-profit organization, Archewell, as well as the author of her new book, The Bench, which lists her as Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. So her decision to not include her royal title on Lili’s birth certificate marks one of the first time she forwent her duchess name.
Just to be clear: What name did she use on the birth certificate?
“Rachel Meghan Markle.” Which makes you wonder why she didn’t use her married name, which would be Meghan Mountbatten-Windsor. As a parent, I already knew that in most states, the application for a birth certificate asks mothers to use their full maiden names. So, the next step in our search is to find out what California puts on its birth record application.
But, it looks like California doesn’t have a statewide application for birth certificates.
What we do here is find out what county Lili was born in and track down that county’s birth certificate application. And, just as I thought: Santa Barbara county asks for the mother’s name before marriage or civil union (otherwise known as her maiden name).
Wasn’t there a faster way of doing this?
Of course there was. ET Canada did an article explaining that the reason the Duchess used her maiden name was that the form required it. And TMZ published a copy of the certificate that clearly showed that it asked for the mother’s birth name. But, you learned something about finding primary resources, didn’t you? And it’s always best to confirm details with the most official resource you can find because you can’t depend on other news articles to get it right.
Key Takeaways:
- Always read more than one article on a particular topic.
- The best source is a primary source.
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