The states that do require a funeral directors involvement in signing the death certificate, burying or cremating the body etc are the states of Alabama, Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska, New Jersey, and New York.
There's no requirement to have funeral but in those states a funeral director is required to be involved in the process.
Funerals are not required by law and in most states you do not legally require the use of a funeral home or funeral director to bury the body.
You do need a permit though to transport a body which you can get by asking the hospital or a morgue or if someone dies in your home you can legally remove the body yourself after a police officer shows up.
Some people have a funeral director come and remove the body but you can remove the body yourself and transport them to the grave if you want too.
You can even transport a loved ones body out of state with a permit.
You'll need to get a burial transit permit.
In order to legally transport a dead body you have to obtain a burial transit permit.
This burial transit permit is a record of the deceased's cause of death, their personal information, your contact information, and the release documentation needed to transport your loved one's remains.
The reasons graves are 6 feet deep is because of the plague that occurred in the year 1665 and so the graves had to be at least 6 feet deep to prevent the spread of bacteria and viruses and prevent the spread of the plague.
It's because of health reasons that bodies have to be buried at least 6 feet deep now.
The net over the casket is a pall.
The pall over the casket is a rich cloth pall that is used to cover the casket or coffin during the funeral and grew during the Middle Ages; initially these were brightly colored and patterned, only later black, and later still white. They were usually then given to the Church to use for vestments or other decorations.
The net over a body in a casket is a casket veil and the casket veil, also called a pall or mortcloth, is a veil that is placed over the corpse inside the coffin.
These casket veils embellish the display of the body itself during a wake or before a burial, and also grant dignity and respect to the deceased by covering the body with a beautiful garment.
Some types of coffins do eventually collapse after many years.
However metal coffins may not collapse until 100 years or so later on.
Wood coffins will rot and collapse within a few years to 10 years and eventually the body will naturally decay and rot away to bones as well.
Coffins eventually do rot or corrode or fall apart after many years.
For wood coffins they usually rot within a few years to 10 years after being buried but other coffins may last until 50 to 300 years or more.
Eventually the body will rot out and decay to nothing but bones even in the coffin within 20 years time.
The reason we bury bodies in coffins is to prevent decay of the body and to prevent odors and protect the environment from the decaying body as well.
Also the coffin is used to allow family to view the body and easily lower the body into the grave.
Although people will still rot in a coffin it just takes a bit longer and eventually the coffin unless it's stainless steel will either rust away or rot away in the ground and expose the body.
Coffins have long been used when burying bodies to prevent the odor of decay and to give the family members closure and prevent them from witnessing the decomposition of their loved ones, and in many cultures it has been seen as a necessary step for the deceased to enter the afterlife or to give back to the cycle of life.
Although in reality there's nothing harmful to the earth by allowing a body to rot into the ground because it's natural.