Italian Constitutional Court Rules Children Must Have Both Mother And Father's Surname

Italy's Highest Court Has Ruled That It Is "Discriminatory and Harmful To The Identity Of The Child" For Children To Only Take Their Father's Surname.

Laudetur Iesus Christus.

ROME - Italy's highest court ruled on Wednesday that newborn children should by default carry both parents' surnames and not just the father's, as had been the status quo.

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The Italian Constitutional Court in Rome said that automatically assigning a child just their father's surname was constitutionally illegitimate.

The court said parents should each have a say in their child's surname as it constitutes a "fundamental element of personal identity."

Going forward, a child will take both parents' surnames, with mutual agreement on the order of the names, the court said.

For the first time, the order would also make it possible for children to solely carry their mother's last name, something which was previously prohibited for children of married parents in Italy.

The rule should apply to children born to married and unmarried parents, as well as adopted children, the court said.

Cecilia D'Elia, a centre-left Italian politician and a self-declared feminist, called the current naming procedure "the last patriarchal sign of family law." Giving the mother "the same dignity as that of the father," she wrote on Twitter, was "simply a sign of civility."

The Italian legislature is now tasked with passing laws that specify how the court's ruling will be implemented.

The Italian Minister of Family and Equal Opportunities, Elena Bonetti, said in a statement that the government backed the ruling, which was "another fundamental step in achieving equal rights between the women and men of our country."

The practice of automatically assigning the father's surname to a child amounted to discrimination against women and children; she told the Italian newspaper Corriere Della Sera.

Italy had until now carried "a story of male biographies," Bonetti said. "The surname is part of one's identity and personal history, a story that we can now pass on written in the feminine."

Pope Francis and Italy's political leaders have expressed concerns about the impact of a declining birth rate on the country, with the cost of raising children seen as one of the factors. The Vatican is yet to comment on the law change.