At the beginning of the 1900s, grim predictions punctuated the debate over women's suffrage. Everyone in the family unit would be damaged in innumerable ways if this outrage were allowed to happen, argued the critics, some of whom went so far as to predict the end of civilization itself.
Half a century later, another historic social change was in the offing, and the warnings of impending disaster were at least as dire. Indeed, some opponents of the movement to extend civil rights to people of color in our country were so sure that personal and social ruin were lurking around the corner that they fought with filibusters, nooses and guns to maintain the status quo.
Forecasting the future evidently is a difficult thing to do. Looking back is obviously easier, and it leads to two unambiguous conclusions. First, whether the effort is to give women the vote, provide African-Americans with equal rights, create access for people with disabilities -- or level the playing field for any other discriminated-against segment of the population -- there will be nay-sayers who insist that horrible things will occur if the sought-after change is allowed to transpire. Second, they will be wrong.
No, this is not a commentary about "don't ask, don't tell" or any other gay rights issue, though the identical observations would certainly apply. Rather, it's about providing legal and moral equality for a segment of our population that is not generally perceived as deprived of any rights: the approximately 7 million Americans who were adopted into their families. And the right denied to most of them is so basic that it almost sounds like a joke: access to their own original birth certificates.
There are lots of reasons that adopted people want the same documents, containing the same information, that the rest of us take for granted. Some have medical motives, including individuals who need a matching organ or information about an inherited disease; others want to know about their heritage or genealogy (anyone remember Alex Haley?) or why their eyes are green or what their original names were; and many yearn to see the faces of the women and men who gave them life.
At the bottom line, however, those are not the reasons it should matter to everyone that adopted people, on reaching the age of majority, cannot automatically obtain their own original birth certificates like the rest of us. We should care, and we should feel outraged, for the same reason so many men supported suffrage for women and so many white Americans joined the civil rights struggle -- because we should find it offensive when any minority group in society is deprived of equal rights.
Here's where the nay-sayers come in. Honest-to-goodness, the following are among the consequences they say will occur if state legislatures give adult adoptees the right to access their original birth certificates: The number of adoptions in our country will fall, the number of abortions will rise, the lives of women who were promised lifelong anonymity when they placed their children for adoption will be ruined and, yes, adoption itself will be in peril.
Research in the field, including by the independent, nonpartisan think tank that I head, refutes or calls into serious question every one of those claims; here you can read the latest report on the subject.
Equally important, this is not a guessing game or a social experiment. During the last decade, more than a half-dozen very diverse states in terms of geography and politics -- from Oregon to Alabama to Maine -- have done what the nay-sayers warned them not to do, and two states -- Alaska and Kansas -- never sealed these documents, as most of the nation did in the last century. Guess what calamitous fallout there has been in these states.
None.
Will some people face difficult or unexpected situations, or even get hurt, as a result of extending this right from coast to coast? Almost certainly, but we know from research, experience and official statistics (in the above states) that the numbers of those adversely affected will be tiny -- and we should do all we can for them by taking steps such as providing public notice, offering counseling, and giving women who placed their children for adoption the ability to officially declare if they do not want to be contacted.
Is this issue as important as women's rights or civil rights or disability rights or gay rights? Maybe or maybe not, but it's not a contest to see which group should get rights and which should not. Besides, this much is certain: Every additional day, month and year that original birth certificates remain sealed, some more adoptees and birth parents who want or need to find each other will give up instead, and some more will die, without ever filling the hole in their hearts.
So it sure does feel important to the people who are deprived. And if we understand that it's about equality and social justice for another group of Americans -- 7 million of them -- maybe we'll feel it, too.
Adam Pertman is Executive Director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute and author of "Adoption Nation: How the Adoption Revolution is Transforming Our Families - and America," which is scheduled for release in April and has been reviewed as "the most important book ever published on the subject."
Rita Nakashima Brock, Ph. D.: On the Anniversary of Roe v. Wade, Let's Honor Mothers
These are not simple curiosities. If you're not adopted, then you have every right to your original birth certificate, regardless of the circumstances of your birth. There is NO reason why state governments should be in the business of LYING, under the guise of protection. They tax all of us, but no one stands in your way when you send in your $21 to get your OBC.
Who are you to demand the state stand in ours?
Folks there's an easy solution that won't please everyone, but it will protect those who DO want anonymity, the ones who DESPERATELY want to not be found.
If the woman is interested in being found, she should make that known to the agency or attorney that helped her with the adoption placement. At the time of a closed adoption, she should be counseled and asked if she would be open to being located, should the child seek to unseal the adoption file. If she says "no," her wishes must be respected.
If she says "no" but later in life decides she would be open to it, she should be given the option to let the agency or court know.
Nothing is going to change the fact that, by the circumstances of life and birth, adoptees cannot have exactly the same life situation that non-adoptees have. Some adoptees cannot access their original birth record, because there is identifying information about another human being on that record. The rights of both human beings have to be protected. Consequences of violating one human being's rights over the other's have to be weighed out ... which can lead to the more serious loss? Despite the loss of "rights", sometimes you have to put another human being's rights over your own, because the loss could be more devastating for them.
Now folks are saying, "once you CHOOSE to have a baby and place for adoption, you lose the right to anonymity." I'm sorry but just when, exactly WHEN, does a woman stop being as much a human being with as many rights as the baby/child/now-grown adult that she grew in her body??
What about her right to her own medical privacy and her choices of how to deal with her own past? What if she was raped? What if the bio dad is her own dad? Does that all HAVE to be dredged up because some grown adult out there can't rest without knowing it all? This issue makes me so angry - I feel for the women, maybe not a huge number, but even a few still have their rights too.
Abortion ≠ adoption; pro-choice/physical autonomy for women ≠ closed adoption.
Then going forward let the OBC be yet another incentive for men to quit running around CHOOSING to rape their daughters. The state has NO business covering up for such men via falsified official documents. If YOU lie on an official state or federal document, you get thrown in jail.
Until our culture can reach some concensus regarding reproductive practices, present laws will be challenged and ultimately decided by the courts on an ad hoc, case-by-case basis. Judges are not social workers nor family therapists; to expect them to solve the issue using property and tort laws is absurd.
We must discuss and debate these new technologies and the changes in social mores that have occurred since the 1940s when many adoption laws were passed, then codify them in better legislation. Without a process and legal standards to make informed choices, society will only fall further behind technology. Real human children will suffer for our failure to seek a solution.
We must begin by protecting every human's right to know his/her origins. How they choose to use that information may be subjected to some legal conditions, but not that fundamental right.
The UK Parliament took up the challenge and one proposal made a lot of sense:
Two documents -
One to be used for identification: Current name, date and place of birth, names of legal parent(s)
The other is a medical record: Genetic parents, gestational carrier and any other info that the individual and his/her doctors would want to know.
Everyone gets both - even those being raised by their biological/genetic parents - no exceptions. That way the individual KNOWS there's another document.
If it's a very young teen or preteen, and the dad is a married man who of course wishes to remain anonymous for obvious reasons.... exactly WHOSE name is going to be placed on that OBC?
If the dad is someone who raped the girl, exactly WHOSE name will be placed on that OBC?
Who is the adult adoptee going to have access to when everyone around them starts chanting "search, search, search!"
This is an issue of the rights of girls and women, too.
There is an inherent contradiction in the legislatures avowed intent to preserve the interest and welfare of adoptees by sealing their orginal birth certificates when in fact adoptees are psychologically harmed by denying them access to the fact of their birth.
Pertman has encountered every argument against the dooms-day with credible data if adult adoptees were given access to the truth about their birth. His logic should have an appeal to any one who is sensitive to social justice and has the appreciation for the history of civil rights movements in the country.
Dr. Paul Sachdev, Ph.D. is Emeritus Professor of Social Work, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, NL Canada. He is the authors of : “Unlocking the Adoption Files,” “Adoption: Current Issues and Trends,” and “Sex, Abortion and Unmarried Women.” He received the University President Award for Outstanding Research. E-mail: psachdev@mun.ca
Those who favor status quo point up unsubstantiated fears about the loss of familial privacy and unwanted intrusion or disruption of relationship if openness in adoption is advocated. Sadly enough, they are not prepared to accept the abundance of research evidence offered by Pertman that NO untoward impact of information given to adopted persons occurred in countries and states where access to the original birth certificate was not legislated, including more than a half dozen states where statutes approving access have been passed. With respect to the nay-sayers concern for the privacy right of birth parents the statutes and the proposed bills provide no-contact option to birth parents who do not wish their identity revealed. Further, it was abundantly clear from my studies of reunions and adoption disclosure that adoptive relationship strengthened after adoptees had met their birth relatives. Adoptive parents felt reassured of the adoptees’ love and allegiance to them knowing the adoptees did not seek substitute parents and they did not conduct search surreptitiously.
Pertman further maintains that while all adoptees have longing to know about or to meet the human being who conceived them, the amount and kind of information sought differs with each adoptee. In my studies I noted a huge majority of adoptees (93.3%) described their reunion experience as “unique” which was epitomized in the words of one adoptee: “I was finally born when I found my birth mother. Prior to that I was only adopted.”
Re: Civil Right: Adoptees Should Have Right To Their Birth Certificates
Pertman’s arguments in supporting adoptees right to have their original birth certificates ,are cogent as well as valid when viewed in light of his scholarly background that is anchored in his rich and in-depth knowledge of the scientific data on adoption.
Pertman took us through the corridors of American history which is replet with periods of intense debates and dire warnings of doomsday if equal rights were granted to women and to people of color or of different sexual orientation. Yet heavens did not fall when the society shook off the status quo and embraced equal rights under the law for all its citizens. Once again, there is intense debate taking place around the country about another civil and moral right: the right of adoptees to access to the birth records and as before stiff resistence is offered by those who rely on fallacies and substantially flawed arguments.
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Incidentally, our country wasn't founded on outcome based legislation that might raise or lower some percentage. It was founded on individual and equal rights.
The only name Patricia had was that her mother had had another daughter with the same name. I believe she was lucky in that (1) she had very detailed non-ID and (2) she just happened to hear her mother's story on TV. I know adoptees who have used very little information and no names to find family.
Did you also know that birth family can find their adopted out relatives with just a birth date and sometimes without. I just helped someone find a possible long-lost cousin. All we had was the mother's alias (HER mother's maiden name), a city and an 11 year window for the DOB.
"That mother at her age should not have had to go through that for Oprah to get ratings."
I might remind you that it was Oprah, not Patricia, who outed their mother on national TV.
As more resources come online, there will be more reunions. Many people are waiting (somewhat) patiently for the 1940 US Census to be released in April 2012.
If you really want to lower the percentages (and punish the majority of adoptees and their birth parents) I have some suggestions:
Prevent release of the 1940 US Census
Make genealogy a crime
Shut down the Internet
From the FAQs on a website sponsored by the Infant Adoption Training Initiative: http://birthparent.us/laws/ALABAMALAWS.pdf
"One provision of the Alabama consent allows the birth mother to agree to release
identifying information to the adopted child, upon the child’s attaining the age of 19. If
she checks she agrees to that release, then the child will be able to open the file. If
she checks she does not agree, then the child will not be able to open the file, except
for medical information."
According to the state of Alabama, original birth certificates and court files are available to ALL adoptees upon attaining age 19:
http://www.adph.org/vitalrecords/index.asp?id=1567
"Obtaining Pre-Adoption and Other Birth Certificates from Alabama Sealed Files
"In 2000, the legislature amended the vital records law to allow an adult whose original birth certificate was placed in a "sealed file" to obtain a non-certified copy of that record and any other documents in the "sealed file."
This does not preclude contact or sharing of information if mutual consent exists.
Lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater.
And on another note, lets stop the personal attacks against posters.
Safe Haven laws exist in all 50 states and DC. If they want TOTAL ANONYMITY, they can get it under existing law. That will not change.
"This does not preclude contact or sharing of information if mutual consent exists."
Mutual consent registries are abysmal failures and have been for over 30 years. This is not a new idea. When you can figure out how dead people can register, how to inform women that the child they had been told was stillborn was actually adopted, where the states are going to find the money to sufficiently publicize the registries, and how to reunite siblings when they don't even know the other exists - then we might get somewhere. Until then - it's an idea that only works for 5% of adoptees, their first parents and their siblings. The government can do better by getting out of the way.
"Lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater."
But it's perfectly okay to throw those babies under a bus after they're born.
No one is against contact when both parties want contact. Are you for the ability to contat even if the biomom does not want it?
"Lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater."
But it's perfectly okay to throw those babies under a bus once they're adopted.
But here's a repost of WHY they don't work:
So how do we know who wants contact and who doesn't? I've seen far too many instances of mothers who DID want contact and:
...did not know that they could make their wishes known to the state.
...were deceased by the time the state allowed them to make their wishes known.
...were told the child had been stillborn or died in infancy.
...HAD placed waivers in their files at the adoption agency and thought that was all they needed to do.
...HAD registered with the state but were not matched with the adoptee.
...HAD registered with the state but needed to find the birthfather and get him to register before a match would be made.
...could not remember the date or even the year of birth because they had been given amnesia producing drugs during labor.
I could go on, but I hope you get the point.
I can also add that SOME adoptees want their original birth certificates but do NOT want to be in contact, or want to do some research before they make a decision.
But registries are not the answer to the civil rights issue of adoptee access to their own birth certificates, and never will be. They are not a compromise but a sell-out.
Compromise won't make this better. Entertaining their ridiculous arguments won't improve the situation. Introducing more inequity into adoption law won't solve anything.
Adoptees are easy targets. We are, in the eyes of many, so flawed that our own mother didn't keep us. We're targeted frequently. We're asked to justify our very existence. Yet, we've no reason to cower and make concessions. We could, instead, stand up, be proud, and demand what is rightfully ours. We really don't have anything to lose but the stigma. What are they going to do? Take away our birth day? It's already gone.
You want her blood type, her medical history, her family tree. That is hers as much of more than yours.
By the way, no one on this board is threatening you.
That is the sort of irrationality I could understand a biomom wanting to avoid.
In otherwords, resoundingly, "YES!"