Illinois case tests whether a 1973 home-rule exemption still limits genealogical access to pre-1916 vital-record indexes
I’m the plaintiff in Los v. Gordon, No. 26 CH 03705, currently pending in the Cook County Chancery Division, and I recently wrote up the case’s procedural and statutory history for anyone interested in Illinois genealogy, public-record access, home rule, or statutory interpretation.
The dispute concerns 410 ILCS 535/24, which says that indexes of vital records held by local registrars and county clerks and originating before January 1, 1916 “shall be made available to persons for the purpose of genealogical research.”
But the same section also retains a sentence dating to 1973
Cook County argues that because the genealogy-access provision originated in the 1973 amendment, and Cook County is a home-rule unit, the genealogy requirement does not apply to the Cook County Clerk.
My opposition raises a somewhat different statutory-history question: does the phrase “this amendatory Act of 1973” permanently exempt Cook County from the genealogy provisions of Section 24 as they exist today, particularly after later amendments altered the operative language? The 1973 provision originally referred to access for members of Illinois genealogical societies; the modern statute refers more broadly to “persons” conducting genealogical research.
There is also a separate home-rule issue. Cook County relies in part on its existing paid, staff-mediated genealogy process, but the ordinance cited in its motion concerns fees for genealogical certificates. The case therefore raises the question of what local enactment, if any, authorizes an exclusive staff-mediated process as a substitute for statutory index availability.
The County’s motion to dismiss is now in the final briefing stage. Its reply is due August 20, followed by a Clerk Status on August 24.
I put together a more detailed discussion of the briefing, statutory history, administrative-code issue, home-rule doctrine, and the questions likely to matter as the case proceeds:
I’d be particularly interested in thoughts from people familiar with Illinois legislative history, home-rule jurisprudence, archival access, or genealogy research. The question that interests me most is how courts should treat an old limitation directed specifically at “this amendatory Act” when the underlying statutory provision has subsequently been amended and remains codified decades later.
Disclosure: I am the plaintiff, so this is obviously not a neutral observer’s account. The linked piece lays out both Cook County’s argument and my response so readers can evaluate the issue themselves.
I will be updating my substack regularly as the four cases that I have pending move through the system.