Yucatán Forced to Adapt After High Court Legalizes Hyphenated Names

Yes, you can hyphenate your baby’s last name in Yucatán. Strangely enough, that would have been illegal a week ago.

In most of Mexico, parents have been allowed to combine their surnames when naming their children. But until last week, for whatever reason, Yucatán was different. The state had strict rules about hyphenated names, but the law didn’t last very long.

Before the ruling, parents could choose only one surname from each side of the family, and they couldn’t hyphenate them or use more than two in total. That meant families who wanted to preserve both parts of their heritage through compound surnames were out of luck.

Now that’s changed. Mexico’s Supreme Court of Justice unanimously struck down Yucatán’s restrictions on December 10, declaring them unconstitutional and ordering the state to allow the same naming flexibility that exists throughout most of the country.

To understand what this means, it helps to know how Mexican surnames typically work. In Mexico, people traditionally carry two surnames: the first surname from their father, followed by the first surname from their mother. So if Juan García López marries María Hernández Pérez, their daughter might be named Ana García Hernández.

But what if Ana’s parents wanted to keep both of their own surnames connected? Maybe they wanted their daughter to be Ana García-López Hernández-Pérez, preserving the full heritage from both families. Or perhaps they wanted to hyphenate just the maternal side: Ana García Hernández-Pérez.

Until this ruling, Yucatán’s Civil Registry Law said no. The law specifically banned compound surnames and restricted families to using just two simple surnames total. Parents had to pick either García or López from dad’s side, and either Hernández or Pérez from mom’s side. No hyphens allowed.

The restriction dated back to Decree 747/2024, which the state published in April 2024. The National Human Rights Commission immediately challenged it, arguing that the government had no business dictating such personal family decisions.

The Supreme Court agreed. All nine justices voted to invalidate the problematic language in Article 40 of Yucatán’s registry law. The court found that the restrictions violated parents’ constitutional right to make decisions about their children’s identity without arbitrary government interference.

“This choice is a personal and emotional moment, which is why it falls within their private sphere,” the court’s ruling stated. “No one but the parents or adopters cares about how their children will be named, and no one is better suited than they are to make the best decision for their children.”

The decision aligns Yucatán with practices in the rest of Mexico, where compound surnames and creative combinations have long been accepted. Minister Yasmín Esquivel Mossa noted there’s simply no legitimate reason under constitutional equality principles to stop people from bearing surnames that reflect both of their parents’ full names.

For many Mexican families, surname choices carry deep cultural meaning. Compound surnames can preserve maternal family names that might otherwise fade away over generations. They can honor important family connections or maintain links to indigenous heritage. The restrictions prevented families in Yucatán from making choices that families elsewhere in Mexico could make freely.

The change takes effect immediately for new birth registrations. Parents bringing newborns to register at the civil registry can now use compound surnames or register more than two simple surnames, as long as both parents agree. The same rights apply to adoptive parents registering adopted children.

Families who registered children under the old rules can potentially seek modifications to birth certificates, though the process would need to respect any existing legal rights. The Supreme Court’s decision doesn’t automatically change existing records, but it opens the door for corrections.

According to La Jornada, the ruling represents part of a broader trend in Mexican courts recognizing that naming conventions involve fundamental identity rights. The justices determined that states can’t impose restrictions that lack clear constitutional justification.

The Supreme Court issued its ruling on May 20, but it only became official in Yucatán this week after publication in the state’s official gazette. The decision also appeared in Mexico’s Federal Official Gazette in October and in the Judicial Weekly of the Federation on December 5.

Key Facts About the Ruling

• Case number: Unconstitutionality Action 115/2024
• Decision date: May 20, 2025
• Publication in Yucatán: December 10, 2025
• Vote: Unanimous (9-0)
• Law affected: Article 40 of Yucatán’s Civil Registry Law
• Who can use it: Parents and adoptive parents registering children
• Applies to: New birth registrations immediately; existing records may be modified through petition