• The Business Services Division registers corporation
  Corporation
  A corporation is created under the laws of a state as a separate legal entity that has privileges and liabilities that are distinct from those of its members. There are many different forms of corporations, most of which are used to conduct business. Early corporations were established by charter...
  
  s and other business entities, as well as trademark
  Trademark
  A trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...
  
  s, DBA statements
  Doing business as
  The phrase "doing business as" is a legal term used in the United States, meaning that the trade name, or fictitious business name, under which the business or operation is conducted and presented to the world is not the legal name of the legal person who actually own it and are responsible for it...
  
   and lien
  Lien
  In law, a lien is a form of security interest granted over an item of property to secure the payment of a debt or performance of some other obligation...
  
  s filed pursuant to the Uniform Commercial Code
  Uniform Commercial Code
  The Uniform Commercial Code , first published in 1952, is one of a number of uniform acts that have been promulgated in conjunction with efforts to harmonize the law of sales and other commercial transactions in all 50 states within the United States of America.The goal of harmonizing state law is...
  
  .
• The Elections Division administers election
  Election
  An election is a formal decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy operates since the 17th century. Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the...
  
  s and voter registration
  Voter registration
  Voter registration is the requirement in some democracies for citizens and residents to check in with some central registry specifically for the purpose of being allowed to vote in elections. An effort to get people to register is known as a voter registration drive.-Centralized/compulsory vs...
  
  , and regulates campaign finance
  Campaign finance
  Campaign finance refers to all funds that are raised and spent in order to promote candidates, parties or policies in some sort of electoral contest. In modern democracies such funds are not necessarily devoted to election campaigns. Issue campaigns in referendums, party activities and party...
  
  . The Secretary of State also serves as the chairperson of the South Dakota Board of Elections.
• The Administrative Services Division licenses notaries public
  Notary public
  A notary public in the common law world is a public officer constituted by law to serve the public in non-contentious matters usually concerned with estates, deeds, powers-of-attorney, and foreign and international business...
  
  , sports agent
  Sports agent
  A sports agent procures and negotiates employment and endorsement contracts for an athlete.In return, the sports agent generally receives between 4 and 10% of the athlete's playing contract, and 10 to 20% of the athlete's endorsement contract, though these figures vary...
  
  s, and lobbyists
  Lobbying
  Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by officials in the government, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying is done by various people or groups, from private-sector individuals or corporations, fellow legislators or government officials, or...
  
  , issues apostilles and concealed pistol permits, authorizes certain types of raffle
  Raffle
  A raffle is a competition in which people obtain numbered tickets, each ticket having the chance of winning a prize. At a set time, the winners are drawn from a container holding a copy of every number...
  
  s, serves as registered agent
  Registered Agent
  A registered agent, also known as a resident agent or statutory agent, in United States business law, is a business or individual designated to receive service of process when a business entity is a party in a legal action such as a lawsuit or summons...
  
   for service of process
  Service of process
  Service of process is the procedure employed to give legal notice to a person of a court or administrative body's exercise of its jurisdiction over that person so as to enable that person to respond to the proceeding before the court, body or other tribunal...
  
  for certain out-of-state citizens and corporations, and publishes the South Dakota Legislative Manual (referred to as the Blue Book).

Other duties

External links

• Official homepage of the South Dakota Secretary of State