NEW YORK: Commentary: My View--All Adoptees Deserve Access to Birth Records, December 7, 2007

BUFFALO NEWS
December 7, 2007

MY VIEW:

All adoptees deserve access to birth records

by Joan Wheeler

I am responding to the Nov. 12 article, “Should adult adoptees know who birth parent is? Report says yes.”

The Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute in New York City issued a nationwide report, “For the Records: Restoring a Legal Right for Adult Adoptees,” indicating that only eight states give adoptees access to their birth records, with positive results. The report urges the rest of America to pass legislation to allow all adoptees the right to their birth records.

In a country that values personal freedom, it is appalling that an estimated 6 million to 7 million people don’t have the freedom to obtain certified copies of their true birth certificates.

Seventy-seven years ago, three men — one U.S. Children’s Bureau legal researcher and two registrars of vital statistics — decided that the “problem” of illegitimacy could be covered up by a fake paper trail.

Babies of illegitimate birth would be protected forever from knowing the horrible truth. When adopted, these babies would be issued an amended “birth” certificate. This idea was written in a national law. One by one, states voted to seal birth certificates and issue new ones for every adoptee, falsely naming the adopting parents as parents by birth. Even the time of birth was indicated and the hospital named.

But not every adoptee is illegitimate. Many are orphans, others are adopted by stepparents. Yet they are lumped together with “shameful” births and punished because of society’s discriminatory judgments. No matter what the circumstances of conception and birth, all American citizens deserve equal treatment under the law. No one needs to be ashamed of being born, or of giving birth.

Fifty-one years ago, I was the fifth child born to married parents. My mother died three months after my birth. There was no help to keep our family together. Our father was encouraged to relinquish me to two parents.

Keeping with the prevailing thought of the times, my adoptive parents didn’t want me to know the truth. Eighteen years later, my siblings found me. Upon learning that I would soon meet my first father, my adoptive father said, “I’m glad the secret is out.”

Today, I’m no longer an adopted child. I’m all grown up now, yet the law still treats me as a child. At age 51, I’m a captive of the sealedrecord law. My original birth certificate is still sealed by New York State. I am not free to obtain a certified copy of it, nor am I legally allowed to even look at it. I must give up my rights to the facts of my birth in favor of a perceived right to confidentiality of my natural parents, or my adoptive parents’ privacy.

My first father was never promised confidentiality. There was no signed contract of confidentiality, as is claimed by opponents of adoptees’ access to birth certificates. My first father was told by the court to stay away from my adoptive parents. He did.

In more progressive countries, such as the Netherlands and Australia, the adoptee — who was a minor when the adoption contract was signed — has rights to the truth that trump either set of parents’ perceived rights to anonymity. To know one’s personal history and ancestry are basic, human questions.

As for natural parents who don’t want to be found, they have the right to say no to personal contact. However, natural and adoptive parents have the responsibility to tell the truth. Each one of us is a product of our genes and our environment. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure this out.

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