[WikiEN-l] Looking up death dates in government death records: original research?

[Will Beback]

Matthew Brown wrote:
  > 1) ...
>  Is it enough to simply match name, approximate age, and state of
> residence in death records to prove someone is dead for BLP concerns?
> 
> 2) Are such lookups in SSDI legitimate sourcing for articles, or are
> they original research?  

> -Matt

Under special circumstances (highly unusual names, extremely advanced 
ages, very small states) the information may be presumed correct. Under 
normal circumstances it's impossible to be sure that one has the right 
entry. My opinion is that the guideline should be to exclude raw primary 
source material like the SSDI but that editors could plead a special 
case, as with any guideline.

-Will Beback