ncogneto_01 wrote:
What I am speaking to is jurisdiction, not property or the like. Just because you put the word private in front of it doesn't necessarily mean it's private, needing an entity like a national government to "protect" that property proves the point.
What one of your juvenile children call private property and the other juvenile child call private property is subject to your (the parent's) definition and arbitrary will -- that is the law of your household.
That micro-example can be extended further to the greatest macro level on earth -- international conficts. What one country calls private and another country call private in this world is subject to any higher stronger power or entity -- might is right.
So whatever you believe you call private is only as private as the enforcement powers aligned with your definition.
If your PRIVATE property by whatever definition is located in what I call the USA then it is subject to eminent domain laws in which
a US govt may take if for compensation of their choice and give it to any other or keep it for no purpose at all as they deem fit. This rule of law applies to fed govt for sure, state govt for sure, and being tested in municipal govt right now.
ncogneto_01 wrote:
A notary or any other official does not recognize foreign documents in ordinary course of business. You said yourself, being unfamiliar with it and unable to comfortably authenticate it, they are under no obligation to accept it. However if the documents follow the guidelines of the jurisdiction that entity works for there shouldn't be any reason they can't accept them. I'm not saying so much that their obligated but they shouldn't be held liable to verify the authenticity of the documents.
I would like to know how you are defining the terms: "recognize", and "foreign documents" in the above context. If our definitions match, then notaries do at times recognize foreign documents in their ordinary course of business.
For example, if you define foreign as anything unfamiliar to them then just about every document that comes before them is 'foreign' until they get to know it by whatever way they do that.
if you define foreign as written in a language unfamiliar to the notary allbeit recognized by the state, then in some states that is the prerogative of the notary. For example if the notary is simply witnessing the signature then most notaries in most states shouldn't have an issue with that. If it's a sworn statement some may be a bit timid about it although it is the same level of responsibility.
In some states like Florida notaries are able to issue certified copies of document, they don't authenticate the document but authenticate that the copy is a true copy of the original. In FL it applies to anything not issued by a gov agency or proxy agent. So they can't do a certified copy of a passport, but they can do a certified copy of a waybill in a foreign language that was issued by a foreign corporation in a foreign country.
As for: "You said yourself, being unfamiliar with it and unable to comfortably authenticate it,"
in that context I was speaking about the ID and the notary's ability to know the person before them not the document presented by the person.
The first duty of all US notaries is to KNOW your signer, the way you know your signer may differ from state to state, in FL it is prescribed only specific types of ID is acceptable. But for NY they essentially leave it to your judgement (no ID required). [again, it has been 13 years since I was a NY notary so that law may have changed]
ncogneto_01 wrote:
... However if the documents follow the guidelines of the jurisdiction that entity works for there shouldn't be any reason they can't accept them. I'm not saying so much that their obligated but they shouldn't be held liable to verify the authenticity of the documents.
I accept the underlined portion as true. The sentence that followed is tricky "shouldn't be held liable to verify the authenticity of the document". They are never responsible for the authenticity of documents presented to them, however they are expected to exercise reasonable care in carrying out their duty. For example just because the ID presented to them is true, and 100% valid, doesn't mean it is the ID for the person presenting it to you.
One time a woman presented me with ID that did not look like her, it was a complete make over from meth-head in the ID to beauty queen in person, I could not accept it. She was able to provide other ID that allowed me to believe it was her driver's license, however the other ID was not acceptable ID for the notarization, so I had to find other ways to believe driver's license was actually hers.
Now to bring both "documents" together the document and the id, in FL car title transfers can be officiated by notaries (think of it as a car closing), they don't authenticate the validity of the title itself however they do do a cursory examination of the document, but their main duty is to make sure that the two parties (buyer and seller) are known to the state (via notary) and that they willingly acknowledge their actions.
That was a weekend, many people had to travel to me in order to do the transaction, please note unlike NYC where notaries are on every corner in FL they are very very hard to find. So if the transaction didn't happen should might have lost a buyer for her car. You can see a suit coming out of that for me refusing to accept her valid ID. Depending on how she showed up looking in court she could easily win or lose the case.
Aso note, all fl notaries must be bonded, probably still not the case for NYS notaries.