In the Interest of C.G., decided today by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, in an opinion by Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley, joined by Chief Justice Annette Kingsland Ziegler, Justice Patience Roggensack, and Justice Brian Hagedorn, holds that there's no First Amendment right to change one's legal name. The case involves a sex offender, and sex offenders are barred by Wisconsin statute from such name changes; but the logic of the opinion would apply to name changes more broadly.
The court noted that Wisconsin law allows people to choose the names they use "in day-to-day affairs" (much as people often go by nicknames, which sometimes aren't abbreviations of their legal names, or much as a considerable number of women use their maiden names in some situations and their married names in others). The petitioner argued that this wasn't sufficient:
Nor does Ella's ability to informally go by a female-sounding name cure this problem. There is a meaningful distinction between the ability to informally identify as Ella [the pseudonym the parties used for the petitioner] and the ability to legally identify as Ella. As discussed, this creates an unconstitutional disconnect between Ella's ability to identify as a woman and the requirement to present legal documentation that does not match her true identity.
