Embassy and consular staff are authorized to notarize documents being sent to their home countries. If a foreign country requests a notarial act for a signer's document that a U.S. Notary isn't authorized to perform, the signer can contact a local consulate or embassy of the receiving nation for assistance.
One of the most common mistakes that notaries make is not printing or signing their name exactly as it appears on their notary commission.
U.S. embassies and consulates provide notarial services like a notary public in the United States. A notary is someone who witnesses you sign a document. In countries that are part of the Hague Convention, get your document notarized by a local notary.
For any non-English document, the best option is to refer the signer to a Notary who reads and writes the language of the document. If that is not possible, the Notary should only proceed if the notarial certificate itself is in English or another language the Notary reads and writes.
In countries that are part of the Hague Convention, get your document notarized by a local notary. You can have the document authenticated for use in the United States. U.S. embassies and consulates may authenticate documents in countries not in the Hague Convention.
In some countries, such as the Netherlands, France, Italy, or Québec (Canada) among others, they also retain and keep a minute copy of their instruments—in the form of memoranda—in notarial protocols, or archives. Notaries generally hold undergraduate degrees in civil law and graduate degrees in notarial law.
And so, typically when you are here in the United States and you need a document notarized for your home country, a regular notary does not have the capacity to do that, but an International Civil Law Notary does and therefore, you have no reason to actually go to a foreign consulate.
The short answer is yes, notary publics are legally allowed to notarize documents from any state as long the notarial act is conducted within the geographical boundaries of the notary's state of commission.
Can a U.S. notary notarize a foreign document? Yes, but as before, the notarial certificate is required to be in English.
If they have the relevant knowledge and experience, Notaries can certainly issue a translation for a birth certificate and certify it. However, they cannot notarize their own translation.