Post Adoption – Finding the Biological Family

As an attorney who has spent years in working with adoptive situations, I can state with certainty that the issue of locating members of ‘the other family’ is one which arises in most adoptions as years pass. The question may be brought up by a Birth Mother seeking information about the adoptive family. The Adopted person may ask about his or her genetic family. There may be siblings who wish to have information. Each person has an emotional investment in the outcome of their search. If a person is adopted as a newborn, he or she may have little information about their cultural heritage and family medical history. Even children adopted later in life develop an awareness that they have missing links somewhere over the horizon with which they might like to connect. Who am I? Am I descended from famous or notorious people? Do I have innate talents I should be developing? Will I have a vulnerability to certain illnesses? Do I have sisters or brothers? Many flail at clues and spend enormous amounts of time and money to find related yet not-related persons. Let’s examine the issue from several perspectives:

First, does an Adopted Person have the RIGHT to know the identities of biological mother and father?

Second, does the biological family have a right to privacy?

Third, what right to all of the parties have to medical or background information? What about the rights of children of the adopted person?

The Cast: The people involved in this issue are not just the Adopted Person and the Birth Mother. There are other individuals who could be involved, some with great emotional or social injury. Consider the Biological Father or Father candidates. There may be biological relatives on each side, especially siblings or half siblings. And consider the Adoptive Family.

Is it legal to search? In most states there is no statute, either criminal or civil, which prohibits biological family members from attempting to search each other out. As will be mentioned later in the article, many states now have special agencies or procedures which will aid the searching party to get information about pre-adoptive circumstances or the status of biological relatives. However, the lack of a specific statute does not mean that any search is legally proper. Every person in the United States has some right to privacy, though it may vary in certain circumstances. If a birth mother concealed her pregnancy and did not tell her family or subsequent husband about the child, then it could be devastating to her in later life to have that secret revealed. This would be true even if the contact by the searching Adoptee is to an aunt or grandparent. The secret is still out. Defamation is an issue. This is damage to the reputation of a person by a written statement or image (libel) or an oral comment (slander). There have been a number of cases in the United States where the adoptee has been held responsible for openly ‘suspecting’ that so-and-so was his biological father and that individual claims damage to his reputation, marriage relationship or some other aspect of his life due to what may or may not be an unjustified claim. Some searchers have been charged with trespass, stalking, invasion of privacy and other offenses to personal rights.

Should an Adopted Child search? Should adopted persons be allowed to investigate what was essentially ‘over and done with’ as a part of the legal adoptive process? In many cases, the adopted person has insecurities, regrets, or concerns which could be easily swept aside if real knowledge is obtained – that she is not the child of a criminal, that her mother did not ‘throw her away,’ and so forth. However in some cases, the truth can hurt, such as when those things did happen. But does the adopted individual have a RIGHT to look? The reality is that the child did not have a part in the decision to change families. The child was an important but non-voting part of the process and stands emotionally and genetically in limbo. Many adopted persons are urgently loved and, when found, are accepted wholeheartedly into the biological families. Within certain safeguards, adopted persons should have the right to ask questions when they have reached appropriate maturity.

Should the birth parents and siblings have a right to search? This question usually encounters less resistance. If the adopted person has reached adulthood and there is no criminal (blackmail or extortion) motivation, then birth family are generally not criticized for searching. The adopted person should have learned by adulthood that an adoption occurred. Although forty years ago, the existence of an adoption might have been concealed in an adoptive context, since then the concept has evolved and most adopted persons are told as children and learn to accept the process as just another creative way to form a family. In this type of search, then, we don’t have the same degree of risk of damage to reputation which can exist when a child searches for birth family.

Should the Adoptive Parents have the right to prohibit the contact? While the adopted person is under the age of majority or remains financially dependent upon the adoptive parents, there should be some amount of control which the adoptive parents can legally exert. The existence of a communicating birth family often means that there are conflicting views on parenting and discipline. Teens, whether adopted or biologically born into a family, typically need rules and boundaries. For these reasons, most states do not encourage any search efforts by any adoptive or birth family member until the child has passed the age of majority or older.

If a search is appropriate, how can it be done? There are a number of routes, some are more accessible and effective that others:

1. Reunion Registries: Many states and countries now have registries which are maintained by their social services department where the Adopted Person, a Birth Parent or a Sibling can make application to be given information about the other(s). Generally these registries require that the adopted person have reached the age of twenty one years before the search will be accepted. However, listing of identity and consent to be contacted can be registered at the time the adoptive placement occurs or any time thereafter. The Registry to be used would be that of the state where the adoption occurred, but many searching persons also register with the agencies in the states where the birth parents were known to live, where the birth occurred, and where the adoptive parents lived at the time if different from the place where the adoption occurred. There is often a small fee for the search, but the process is particularly effective because the social services agency has access to the original court file, with details about identities, locations and relatives.

(a) If the Reunion Registry cannot locate the other person, they report that fact and often provide non-identifying information about the adoptee’s background, or,

(b) If the Reunion Registry locates the other person but that person refuses to allow information to be released, then often the Registry agent can still obtain updated medical information, or

(c) Frequently, the Reunion Registry locates the other person who then agrees to the contact, and the parties are reunited.

2. Private, often internet based, registries: there are a number of bulletin boards, and registries which accept information from searchers, to be matched with other searchers if the opportunity arises. For examples, look at the International Soundex Reunion Registry. This is a non-profit service. Send a sase to: ISRR, P.O. Box 2312, Carson City, Nevada 89702 or look at RootsWeb WorldConnect Project: http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/

3. Inquire with the attorney or agency who handled the adoption initially. Many of us retain letters or other information which is to be provided to the adopted person upon request. We may also have information in our files which would allow us to communicate with birth parents and other interested parties. Some birth parents maintain regular ongoing contact so that the attorney or agency has current authorization to release materials if the adoptee should ever inquire.

4. Petition the Court to open the adoptive records. Adoptions are typically sealed court proceedings so a new separate Court action is required to open the file. Typically, some need-to-know must be demonstrated to the Court, such as the urgency to get medical background in order to assist with the diagnosis or treat of a disease. This Court procedure is not the most easy route, and may result in little or no information being provided. Keep in mind, particularly in adoptions which happened prior to the mid-1970’s, it was the adoptive family who was being scrutinized – not the birth mother. Information on her may be limited to a name, and, in my experience (since no verification of her information was required) birth mothers often provided false names and addresses. It was not until adoptive laws began to require that the attorney or agency provide medical background data forms and itemizations of medical expenditures to the Court, that the attorney began to handle more detailed information about the birth mother, including often her social security number since it is usually associated with her medical record. With that social security number, and consent left by the birth mother, tracing her present whereabouts (even though marital name changes) is usually an easy matter.

5. Look at the newspaper archives of the major and minor newspapers which were published in the County where the child was born. When newspapers still printed birth announcements as a part of their public function, they often printed announcements of babies intended for adoption because the newspaper staff had no knowledge of the underlying facts. Further, the decision to release a child may not have been made at birth, but instead, weeks, months or years later. These published announcements are listed by birth date, with birth mother’s name (and father’s if used in connection with the birth certificate).

6. Speak with the physician, nurses or others who provided services to the Birth Mother during her pregnancy and the birth. They may have personal knowledge of the situation and can often be identified though the medical records or birth certificate if the attending physician’s name was not removed when the certificate was re-written after the adoption .   There are hundreds of other methods. Any standard genealogy technique can be used in this type of search. However, at all times and for all purposes, remember that your specific point of view is not the only one, nor the most important. Other people can be irrevocably benefited or injured by your efforts. Adoption brings great joy and great sadness – often by the same act.

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