For some people, their last name may be a connection to their family history and a source of pride. For others, it may be a painful reminder of a difficult past. And for other people still, it may not be something they have ever even given a thought to.
You may have been born with your last name, otherwise known as a surname, or you may have acquired it from a step-parent or through marriage. Down the line, you may be interested in changing your last name due to divorce or some other personal reason.
Whatever the reason may be, it is possible to legally change your name in the state of Illinois. There are, as with many things, requirements set out for changing your last name, and there are different scenarios in which they apply and do not apply. We will break these down below.
Key Takeaways
- In Illinois, you can legally change your last name after marriage, divorce, or for personal reasons, but specific processes and requirements must be followed.
- A criminal history may prevent you from changing your name, especially if you've been convicted of crimes like identity theft or offenses requiring sex offender registration.
- While name changes are allowed multiple times, they must not be used to evade the law, escape liabilities, or commit fraud.
Marriage
If you have recently gotten married and decided to take your spouse’s last name, the process is quite a bit more streamlined than in another situation. Once you have gotten married, you will need to file your marriage license with the court clerk of the county in which you got married. After a period of about two weeks, they will send you a certified copy of your marriage certificate in the mail. Then, you can take the marriage certificate with you to the relevant government agencies, which will need to be notified of your intended name change.
So, these may include the Social Security Office, likely the Secretary of State and the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to update your driver’s license or state identification card, the Department of State for a new passport, and potentially various other agencies such as the military if you are a member of the armed forces. Otherwise, you are good to go once you’ve updated whichever agencies you require identification from, and you do not need any court order or other legal document to affect a last name change.
Request for Name Change
A Request for Name Change form is required if you are changing your name outside of the reason of marriage. You may also need to use this form if you are divorced because if your divorce decree does not explicitly grant you the ability to go back to using your maiden name or some other previous name, then this oversight (or change of mind later on) will require you to take the extra step of going through the court with a request for name change form.
This form provides the court with your basic information, such as:
-your current name
-the name you want to change your name to
-your residency information
-your criminal history or any pending charges
Reason You May be Prohibited from Changing Your Last Name
The reason you’ll need to provide your criminal history is that you are not permitted to change your name if you have been convicted of certain types of crimes, such as a conviction for identity theft or aggravated identity theft. The reasons for this are clear enough: the legal system does not want you or anyone else to evade legal repercussions of past or current criminal behavior, particularly as it relates to the use of false or assumed names. If you’ve stolen someone’s identity in the past, the legal system will not allow you to do so again by just changing your name and thereby “erasing” your criminal history of having done so. This prohibition gets lifted if you have been pardoned for an identity theft conviction.
You are also not permitted to change your name if you have been convicted of a felony and completed your sentence within the last ten years. Other felonies or misdemeanors which prevent you from changing your name include:
-criminal sexual abuse when the victim at the time is under 18 years of age
-sexual exploitation of a child
-indecent solicitation of a child
-indecent solicitation of an adult
-any other offense that requires you to register as a sex offender
Once again, if you have been convicted of one or more of the above-mentioned crimes but have been pardoned, the prohibition will be lifted, and you will be permitted to change your name.
Public Notice of Court Date
In addition to a Request for Name Change form, you will also need to complete a Publication Notice of Court Date for Request for Name Change. This is a form that essentially publicly announces your intention to change your name and provides the public with notice of when the court date will be for you to do so.
How Many Times Can You Change Your Name?
Technically speaking, you can change your name as many times as you want. If you get married seven times, for example, there is nothing within the law that prevents you from changing your name each time you get married to match that of your spouse. You are also permitted to change your name back to your original last name after every divorce. This would be a tedious and repetitive process, but it is not prohibited by the laws of the state of Illinois.
In fact, Illinois treats marriage as a special relationship and encourages all the framework which surrounds marriage. Logically, it also then allows for whatever is needed to seal the bonds of marriage as well as to undo them.
There are some things to consider, as with all laws:
-You can’t change your name to evade the law
-You can’t change your name to escape liability such as child support or spousal maintenance
-You can’t change your name for the purpose of carrying out any type of fraud
These are all pretty obvious. It is not recommended to try to be “clever” and use the process of a name change to operate outside of the lines of societal boundaries. The aforementioned guardrails exist for a reason, and they will prevent you from being able to skirt the rule of law. But, if you need or want, you can become another you in terms of your legal moniker. You just have to follow the guidelines, and you will be ready to go as You 2.0.
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