Requesting Certificates under Law 20/2022, of October 19, on Democratic Memory
Explanatory note for requesting birth certificates from the Civil Registry of the municipality of Barcelona for the purpose of applying for Spanish nationality under Law 20/2022, of October 19, on Democratic Memory.
On October 22, 2025, the deadline to apply for Spanish nationality under the Democratic Memory legislation (LMD) will end. At 11:59 p.m. (local time) on October 22, the possibility to request the Civil Registry Certificate to process Spanish nationality will be closed. Any applications submitted after this date will not be accepted.
Law 20/2022, of October 19, on Democratic Memory (published in the Official State Gazette on October 20), in its eighth additional provision, establishes the conditions for acquiring Spanish nationality. The Instruction of October 25, 2022, issued by the Directorate-General for Legal Security and Public Faith, regarding the right to opt for Spanish nationality under the aforementioned provision of the Law, provides guidelines on the exercise and scope of this right, as well as the procedural rules necessary to streamline the processing of applications at Civil Registry offices.
The Civil Registry of the municipality of Barcelona, held at the Contemporary Municipal Archive, is the archive where records of births, deaths, and marriages that occurred in the city of Barcelona from the year 1835 are kept, as a result of regulations that required municipal secretaries to maintain such records. This registry remained operational until the approval of the Provisional Law 2/1870, of June 17, on the Civil Registry, which established the state-run Civil Registry. This law came into force on January 1, 1871.
