Happy Birth Certificate Day

Dec. 3 was the first day adult adoptees born in Oregon were able to request copies of their own birth certificates, thanks to a ballot measure approved last month. It also was the day some Philadelphia-born adoptees made the same request here, knowing it would be denied.

“It was to make a point,” says C.K. Bertrand Holub, a Germantown resident and member of Bastard Nation, a national adoptees’ rights organization. Bertrand Holub helped organize the rally outside the state office building at Broad and Spring Garden Streets that preceded the symbolic filing of birth certificate requests.

When the ballot measure passed, Oregon became only the third state to allow adults who were adopted to access their own birth records. (Kansas and Alaska are the others.) Implementation of the new law has been delayed by a lawsuit, but Bastard Nation still counts the vote as a victory.

Adult adoptees born in Pennsylvania have been denied access to their birth certificates since 1984. Bertrand Holub says the change was forced by the powerful national adoption lobby – the same folks challenging Oregon’s new law – and anti-abortion activists, who argue that the threat of being found 20 years later would compel more women to abort their unwanted children.

“But not every [adoptee] wants a reunion,” says Bertrand Holub. “Maybe they want to [obtain their birth certificate to] study their genealogy. Maybe they want to frame it and put it on the wall. The point is, those are our records, and we should have the right to get them.”

Adoptees seek state’s help to ease their hunt

Published Sunday, December 6, 1998, in the San Jose Mercury News

Adoptees seek state’s help to ease their hunt

Open-records law urged

BY STEVE JOHNSON
Mercury News Staff Writer

She was adopted 22 years ago when she was just 4, but painful memories linger for Robin Schuettke.

The man who was raising her told her he no longer loved her. He told her to forget him. Was that man her father?

Schuettke has never been able to find out because California — like many states — makes it difficult for adoptees to get at their original birth certificates.

Now, advocates buoyed by recent victories in Tennessee, Delaware and Oregon are pushing to unseal adoption records in more states. And they hope California will be among the next battlegrounds for the rights of adoptees like Schuettke, of San Jose.

“I don’t see why they think they have the right to deny us information on who we are,” said Schuettke, who spent several fruitless years searching for her mother’s and father’s identities. “If I could get those records, it might answer a lot of questions.” … Continue Reading

Adoptees Push for New Laws

People across the country seek access to their original birth records.

Judy McCoy walked into the vital statistics office on Greenwood Avenue on Thursday to request her original birth certificate.

The adoptee, accompanied by friend Ronna Smith and a television news crew that had arrived earlier, were ordered to leave. But Smith and McCoy stood there, refusing to budge until an employee called security. The group left on their own.

“We’re not here to cause any violence,” said Smith, a birth mother who gave up her son for adoption years ago. “We’re just here to pass out information to adoptees and let them know they have civil rights.”

McCoy was one of many adoptees across the country who tried to make a point by walking into vital statistics offices and applying for their original birth records.

Like most states, Oklahoma does not give adoptees “unconditional access” to their original birth records. … Continue Reading

Adoptees protest laws that keep them from heritage

Adoptees protest laws that keep them from heritage
FINDING THEIR ROOTS

By Matthew I. Pinzur
The Macon Telegraph

For 30 years, Michelle Hills knew her own name. Two weeks ago, that changed.

Adopted in Pasadena, Calif., when she was 6 weeks old, Hills recently obtained her original birth certificate after years of searching. She was born Krista M. Branman.

“It’s very interesting to look in the mirror now,” said Hills, 30, who now lives in Macon. “These other two people thought I should be called Krista.”

But many adoptees have not had the same success researching their pasts, prompting more than a dozen protests across the country for Adoptee Rights Day on Thursday. A small group, organized by Hills, demonstrated at the Macon-Bibb County Health Department, where birth certificates are kept.

Most states, including Georgia, will only release an adoptee’s original birth certificate with the birth parents’ consent. What adoptees get instead is an altered document that names the adoptive parents. Some birth certificates, like Hill’s, have other information, such as birthplace, changed as well. … Continue Reading