Territorial and state laws, prior to 1852, required registration of marriages with the Clerk of the Circuit Court. Chapter 492, Laws of Wisconsin, 1852, required the officiating party at a marriage ceremony to file a certificate of marriage with the Register of Deeds for the county in which he performed the marriage within thirty days of the ceremony. The law specified the information required in the certicate to include names of husband and wife; their birthplaces, residences, parentage, and color; husband's occupation; type of ceremony; and name and address of official. The law required the Register of Deeds to record the information on the certificate into bound volumes and to prepare an index. The law permitted registration of marriages contracted before 1852. An 1865 law required the Clerk of the Circuit Court to transmit all marriage records in his custody to the Register of Deeds for filing and registration.
Chapter 492 also created Wisconsin's first requirement for recording births and deaths. The law required the physician attending a birth, or one of the parents, to file with the Register of Deeds a certificate showing the names of the child, of the parents (including mother's maiden name), and of other living children; child's color; father's occupation; date and time of birth; and name of person certifying the birth. A physician or surgeon in attendance when a death occurred was required, under threat of fine, to file a death certificate with the Register of Deeds showing the name, parentage, name of spouse, color, sex, race, occupation, age, and birthplace of the deceased, and the time, place, and cause of death, and burial place. Chapter 202, Laws of Wisconsin, 1897, required a death certificate to be filed with the local health officer or local government clerk prior to issuance of a burial permit. These death certificates were to be forwarded to the Register of Deeds each month. The 1852 law required the Register of Deeds to record in bound volumes, and to index, the information provided in the birth and death certificates. Upon proper proof the law permitted registration of births and deaths not previously recorded.
The 1852 vital statistics law required the Register of Deeds to provide annually to the Wisconsin Secretary of State a copy of all marriage, birth, and death records. Chapter 202, Laws of Wisconsin, 1897, required the Register of Deeds to report on births and deaths to the
State Board of Health. Further legislation in 1905 instructed the Register of Deeds to provide copies of birth, death, and marriage records to the Board of Health rather than the Secretary of State.
Legislation in 1907 restructured Wisconsin's procedures for collection of vital statistics records. Each local government unit became a registration district and each city health officer and village or town clerk became a local registrar. The local registrar was to forward the original marriage, birth, or death certificate to the newly created State Bureau of Vital Statistics within the State Board of Health and to provide a copy of the certificate to the Register of Deeds. The law required local registrars in cities and villages to maintain copies of vital records in their custody.
The Guide to Public Vital Statistics Records in Wisconsin, prepared by the Wisconsin Historical Records Survey, and published by the Survey in 1941, discusses both vital records and records legislation.
