Why do you think adoption records are sealed?

Carnie C

i think it's too allow the afamily to bond as a family. open adoption was something considered back then and i think people wanted to bond as a family, natural or not and having that lingering thought that the nfamily could come back at any time would have been unsettling for an afamily.

I was part of that sealed record generation. I'm fine with it.

Camira B

I was going to go on about Georgia Tann, but I see someone has done that already.

I know it's "justified" by "birth parent privacy". I still don't get the who BC thing. If I make myself a new BC and try to use it, wouldn't I get charged with federal fraud? But the government can do it? Pfft. Figures.

Heather B

The long outdated sealed records laws never had the intention to prevent adopted people from one day finding out who their parents were, but to prevent nosy parkers from stirring up trouble by brandishing the word 'illegitimate' while the children were growing up.

But what has transpired in the USA over the last 50 years is a mess of misconceptions.

How did things get to where they are today? In the early 1980s the records were set to be opened nationwide. Well, the adoption agencies didn't like that idea and scuppered together to form a powerful ($$$) lobbying organization (now known as NCFA) to prevent this from happening. In addition, just to be sure they attempted to get Adoptees records sealed for 99 years.

The organization continues to lobby against granting adoptees the same rights as non adopted persons, although they have been unsuccessful in their arguements, most notably in Tennessee where the supreme court ruled that their 'birthmother privacy' arguement was a farce (Doe v. Sundquist).

In addition their arguement that abortions will increase if Adoptees are allowed access to their own records is ridiculous. Kansas has never sealed it's adoption records and has lower abortion rates than it's neighboring sealed record States.

Interestingly, none of the awful consequences they argue will occur simply have not occurred in those States where Equal Rights Activists have been successful with Bills for Equal Access to records for Adoptees.

In a nutshell. If you're interested in learning more, the book Adoption Mystique by Joanne Wolf Small is very enlightening as to what the agencies did to scuttle the 1978 Model State Adoption Act, Title V of which would've opened the records.

Theresa

The history is so long, and so convoluted, but reading about Georgia Tann can help. A brief summary by the author who wrote about her is at the NYTimes :

"It was begun by Georgia Tann, a conscienceless woman who from 1924 to 1950 operated out of Memphis arranging the illegal adoptions of poor children by middle-class and wealthy couples. She acquired many of these children through kidnapping, and at least 50 of the more than 5,000 children she dealt with died of neglect.

Tann began falsifying adopteesâ€™ birth certificates in 1928. She did so to cover her crimes, but claimed that it spared them the shame of being known to have been adopted â€” and, often, born outside wedlock.

This must have sounded good to well-meaning legislators and social workers, because by 1948 almost every state falsified adopteesâ€™ birth certificates. Today all 50 states do, and the United States has the sad distinction of being one of very few industrialized countries to deny adoptees their birth parentsâ€™ names.

We must eradicate a criminalâ€™s legacy; every state should give adoptees access to their original birth certificates and adoption records. "

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/29/opinion/nyregionopinions/29LIraymond.html

Also it should be noted that some of the first adoptions Georgia facilitated were to state legislators. Notably, NY Governor Lehman, who adopted through her twice, then signed the law sealing NY birth certificate access at her "council". However as Barbara Bisantz writes in "The Baby Thief", a lot of her counseling to legislators was in the forms of threats of natural parents coming back and reclaiming their children.

Edit - Re - Howard & Hemenway - thank you for those names. I do recall reading that this was proposed in the 30's by two Vital Registry registrars, but I didn't know their names.

'Adoption, Identity and Kinship' is an important book, however I don't believe you can discount Georgia's incredible influence and reach. Her falsification began in Tennessee in 1928, which set a dangerous precedence.

As far as I know, Georgia used a 1917 Minnesota adoption model (which still did not seal the birth certificate from the adoptee involved) as the public front for sealing records, while behind closed doors she blackmailed high-profile adoptive parents with threats of letting an adoptee's mother know where he or she was.

Our birth certificates were FALSIFIED at the urging of those well intentioned of the time, but we have Georgia to thank for them being SEALED from our own access. The distinction between the two is where the trouble lies.

Sly

Your article is based on the book, "Family Matters: Secrecy and Disclosure in the History of Adoption" by Carp, also. It didn't hurt that the Big Bad BoogieMommy was the stuff of AP's nightmares! Who had the power in adoption? The agencies and the AP's who were childless and infertile and under pressure to procreate to be truly American.

More importantly, in this day and age, with the rest of the world opening up their records, why do they REMAIN sealed. In my opinion, it is to save the @sses of the perpetrators of the crimes against the mothers used to obtain the surrenders of the children for adoption.

Pirate Girls Kick Butt!

I think advances in medicine and biology have made it more reasonable to have open adoptions. They now know so much more about the physicality of a persons DNA makeup as well as the potetial for mental health problems. Its about having the right to know who you are as an adoptee.

sam22254

In one adoption agency it's because after the adoption the parents and the child are sealed in the church and they don't feel that the birth parents have any rights to the child now or in the Future.

Enter Your Message or Comment

User Name:
User Email:
Post a comment: