HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Imagine going through life with no record of your birth. No document proving where you came from or that you exist. That’s the reality for one Houston woman, Barbara Brown.
As lawmakers push measures like the SAVE America Act, which requires proof of citizenship to vote, that missing piece of paper could determine whether she and others in her position have a voice at the ballot box.
On Brown’s kitchen table, she has a stack of documents marking different parts of her life.
“My shot record, my immunization, my marriage license,” Brown said.
But one crucial moment is missing: the beginning.
“I know I was born and I’m here. I’m a person,” Brown said. “I just feel less than, to be honest with you.”
Brown was born in the 1950s to a midwife in East Texas.
“Back in the woods,” Brown said. “I was born there. These were grandmothers, aunties. No schooling. They just knew that they could do, you know, birth these babies. They didn’t know how to fill out any forms, and nobody cared enough.”
It was the Jim Crow era, a period when many Black Americans were denied equal access to hospitals.
Systemic discrimination and segregation often meant official records were incomplete or never created at all.
“A lot of records that may not have been kept because of the circumstance of so many of the black and brown babies having to be delivered by midwives in someone’s home,” University of Houston History Department Professor Linda Reed said.
Reed said the midwife was responsible for getting that birth recorded.
“Anything could happen between the birth of the baby and getting that record recorded,” Reed said.
For Brown, that missing record is now catching up with her.
She’s trying to get a passport while also racing to renew her driver’s license.
Brown described being in a cycle of paperwork, rejection, and frustration.
“I give them what I have,” Brown said. “And they said, ‘Nope, not good enough.'”
Now, she waits to hear back after sending in more paperwork.
She’s also preparing to apply for a delayed birth certificate, which is a process hundreds of other Texans go through each year.
According to the Texas Department of State Health Services, more than 780 people applied last year, and already more than 160 this year.
The state agency said some are even forced to go to court because they don’t have enough documentation to get their delayed birth certificate.
Without that, people like Brown could face new barriers under proposals like the SAVE America Act.
The bill passed the U.S. House of Representatives and is currently in the Senate.
“They are American citizens, but this is a big obstacle,” Reed said. “It’s simply because of the circumstances under which they were born.”
The cost of trying to get those documents is adding up for Brown.
“Everything that I’m doing is costing me money,” Brown said.
But through it all, her faith keeps her centered.
“My prayers work,” Brown said. “That’s the only thing that keeps me grounded.”
She’s holding onto hope that one day soon, she’ll finally have what’s been missing all along.
“It’s going to have more meaning to me,” Brown said. “It’ll say delayed, but it’s okay, it’s going to show me.”
Nearly a month after speaking with Brown, she updated ABC13 that the passport office confirmed her application was approved. She said she expects to get her passport by next week. Her next goal is to apply for her delayed birth certificate.
This story comes from our news partner ABC13 Houston.