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The WebTexan
VIEWPOINT
ADOPT REFORMS
Texas' decades-old rule keeping adoption records closed is under attack.
The Legislature is considering a proposal enabling adopted children to
discover their biological history and combat potential inherited
disabilities. But Gov. George W. Bush opposes the initiative. Right now,
the governor's clandestine agents are working to defeat proposed Senate
Bill 1445, sponsored by Sen. Chris Harris, R-Arlington, permitting adult
adoptees to learn their biological parents' names. While Gov. Bush has
probably stalled this proposal until next session, he ought to reconsider.
Experts estimate 4 percent of U.S. families include an adopted child.
Overall, 5 to 6 million Americans are adopted. And about 300,000 of them
are actively searching for their roots. But in the 1930s and '40s, most
states passed laws forbidding anyone except social workers and judges to
see adoption records. Texas did so in 1932. Modern medicine's understanding
of heredity's importance, however, makes such laws obsolete.
Every year, we discover genetic influence on another personal
characteristic. Propensity for alcoholism, heart disease and innumerable
other illnesses depend significantly on heredity. And because the
categories of relevant information expand daily, the only effective
solution is to let mature adoptees discover their parents' identity.
The national trend is moving to allowing adoptees to see their birth
certificates and learn their parents' identities. Three states -- Alaska,
Kansas and Tennessee -- have enacted such laws; 11 others, including Texas,
are considering doing the same.
Critics of proposals like SB 1445 put forward a tri-pronged privacy
argument. They suggest that making parental information available to
adoptees violates parents' personal, familial and reproductive privacy. But
in February, the United States Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit upheld
the Tennessee statute opening adoption records. Noting that "a birth is
simultaneously an intimate occasion and a public event," the court ruled
that birth records are not absolutely protected by the right to privacy.
Further, closing records incorrectly values parents' privacy over
children's health. As Jane Nast of the American Adoption Congress remarked,
"If an adoptee comes back to find a birth mother, the mother might be
embarrassed or angry, but she'll get over it." Recognizing that children
have an interest in knowing the circumstances of their births, the 6th
Circuit found the Tennessee law struck the correct balance between parents'
and children's rights.
Some conservatives also think opening records will decrease adoptions,
cause abortions and weaken families. But these arguments fail as well.
The evidence indicates that opening adoption records does not lead to fewer
adoptions or more abortions. In the three states which have opened records,
adoption rates are higher and abortion rates lower than the average of the
closed-record states. England opened adoption records decades ago, yet
studies show no resultant increase in abortion.
Nor does allowing 21-year-olds access to birth records threaten the
adoptive parent-child relationship. If, by the time the child is an adult,
the relationship is so volatile as to be upset by the availability of vital
medical information, greater problems exist.
This is not exclusively a health issue. According to Bastard Nation, a
group advocating open birth records and adoptee's rights, "One's biological
history is as much a part of the essential self as limbs or senses. To be
deprived of knowledge of one's ancestry is to be maimed as surely as to be
deprived of limbs or sight."
Each of us has the right to know who we are. Thus, we applaud Sen. Harris
and those fighting to open adoption records, and we hope Gov. Bush and his
agents reverse their position next session.