N.J. ADOPTEE BIRTHRIGHT BILL: THE "RIGHT TO KNOW" v "THE BALANCE OF RIGHTS"

I have been reading editorials from various New Jersey newspapers supporting the New Jersey Adoptee Birthright Bill, A1406. The bill has passed both houses and now has only one more hurdle. A1406 awaits Governor Christie’s signature in order to become the law.

These editorials shout out how good it is that adoptees will finally have the “right to know.” So many citizens now agree that it’s a good thing for adoptees to finally be able to see their original birth certificate and learn about their past and so they cheer for A1406.
The supporters of the bill say that one of the reasons why A1406 is a good bill is because it contains a “balance of rights.” If Gov. Christie signs the bill, birth parents will get a new right, in law, to veto the issuance of an original birth certificate to their “adult children.” All the birth parents need to do is file an affidavit of disclosure, within the year, requesting that the state keep their identities secret. The affidavit insures that these birthparents will retain their anonymity from their adult adoptees. This request is accomplished by preventing their adult children from receiving an original birth certificate, even though original birth certificates will soon be issued to the other adopted adults in the state. Here’s how it will work.

When a birthparent files the veto, the adoptee is automatically bumped off of the “Right to Know” list. The adoptee’s name will then be indelibly inscribed on “The Right NOT to Know” List, meaning that he or she will not receive an unaltered original birth certificate like the other adoptees. These adoptees will receive only an amended document of their original birth certificate with all identifying information whited-out.

It’s impossible for me to accept the reasons that legislators, the media, lobbying groups, adoption agencies, attorneys, major church organizations, et.al, give for insisting that the adoptee’s “right to know” has to be somehow balanced with the birth mother’s new right to remain anonymous. These groups chose to wear blinders or else they are ignorant about the original intent of sealed records. They are revisionists, rewriting history. For their own personal interests, they have found it expedient to elevate birth mothers to the top of the food chain – something that never happened. Ask any first mother how she was treated at the time she relinquished her child.

This revisionist version of history says that promises and assurances were made to first mothers long ago that their identities would be kept secret from their children forever. Now that the state is getting reading to unseal most original birth certificates, it believes that it must uphold these long-ago “promises”. And the way they will do that is to snuff out an adoptee’s right to know.

The irony of the situation is that the birth certificate is sealed only upon the decree of adoption, not upon the birth mother’s relinquishment. A child relinquished but not adopted has an unsealed birth certificate. If protection of the birth mother was intended, the original birth certificate would be sealed upon the termination of her legal relationship to the child, not at the beginning of the legal relationship of the adoptive family.

If truth be told, adoptive parents were relieved that birth certificates were sealed because many of them were afraid that the birth parent might locate them a few years later and grab their child back. I know my mother was always afraid that “that other family” as she called them, might kidnap me. (Could that have been her conscience bothering her?)

The adoptive family was considered sacred in law - the forever family - and no outsider should ever be let in. What better way to accomplish this than to impound and seal in perpetuity all birth records.

It is readily apparent that our birth records were not sealed to protect our first parents from anything. Therefore, there should be no acceptable reason today for the state to give any birth mother a new right, in the law, to keep her identity a secret from her child. Furthermore, the state has no business upholding promises made between private parties.

In 1999, the Oregon Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court’s decision, holding that birth       mothers have no constitutional guarantee of privacy regarding the fact that they relinquished a child, despite promises they may have received that their identities would be protected. [Doe v State of Oregon, 164 Or.App. 543, 993 P. 2nd 833, 834 (1999).

If the state wants to restore the “right to know” to its adopted citizens, then it must guarantee, through legislation, that 100% of the adopted men and women will receive the same right. It is the civil and human right of every adoptee in the state to be able to request and receive an unaltered, original birth certificate, with no vetoes or other conditions tacked on.

The New Jersey Adoptee Rights Bill, A1406, does not guarantee the “right to know” to each and every adopted person in the state. The bill adds to the adoption law a new “right” allowing first mothers to keep their identities secret from their own adult children at the expense of their adoptee’s “right to know.”

This bill is flawed, and I would urge the governor to veto it. It is not a true Adoptee Birthright bill – by any means.

VOTE NO TO NEW JERSEY ADOPTEE BIRTHRIGHT BILL

URGENT: STOP NJ A1406/S799 - FLOOR VOTE SCHEDULED FOR MONDAY, MAY 9, 2011.




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BASTARD NATION ACTION ALERT!



STOP DISCLOSURE VETO/WHITE OUT LEGISLATION IN NEW JERSEY!!!



ASK THE NEW JERSEY ASSEMBLY: VOTE NO ON A1406/S799



Read full text of A1406 here.

Read full text of S799 here

A1406 (companion to S799 already passed in the NJ Senate) is scheduled for a floor vote on MONDAY MAY 9, 2011.



Please contact Assembly members immediately and urge them to VOTE NO ON A1406/S799. (Contact information below.) If you are from or in New Jersey or have a New Jersey connection, mention it in your communication.

Be sure to put: "Vote No On Adoptee Birthright Bill "in the header



Bastard Nation's letter to the Assembly is here.



A1406/S799 is: restrictive, discriminatory, creates a new, special and temporary ”right” for "birthparents," and exempts the state's adopted adults from equal protection and treatment regarding the release of the government-generated public record of their births.

THE BILL



*includes a 12- month open enrollment period, starting after the Department of Health releases regs for A1406/S799 implementation, that allows "birthparents," to file disclosure vetoes (DV) before obcs, past and future, are unsealed



*authorizes the state to replace the original birth certificat, of those subjected to the DV with a mutilated copy of the obc with all identifying information, including the address of the parent(s) at the time of birth (if it appears on the cert) deleted.



*requires "birthparents" who file a disclosure veto to submit a family history and a possibly illegal intrusive medical form to activate the veto.



*requires "birthparents" who file a "contact preference form," which, in fact, acts as a disclosure veto, to fill out the same family history and possibly illegal intrusive medical history form to activiate the veto.



*seals by default all "safe haven" birth certificates, even though most "safe haven" babies are born in hospitals to identified mothers.



*requires adoption agencies and adoption lawyers to receive a written veto status report from the state before they can release identifying information to adoptees



*requires the state to mount an "information" campaign to inform "birthparents" of their "protection" options

A1406/S799 IS NOT AN OBC ACCESS BILL.

A1406/S799 IS NOT ABOUT RIGHTS.

A1406/S799 IS ABOUT PRIVILEGE

Bastard Nation: The Adoptee Rights Organization opposes legislation that denies any adult adoptee access to his or her own original birth records on par with all other citizens. Please let the Assembly know that this issue is not about relationships between adoptees and their "birthparents." It is about basic human and civil rights.



Passage of bad legislation is New Jersey could easily undermine efforts of dedicated reformers who are holding the line for adoptee rights in other states.



New Jersey's A1406/S799 is an abomination in light of the restoration of the right of original birth certificate access to all persons adopted in Oregon, Alabama, and New Hampshire, and Maine. Adult adoptees and all who support adoptee rights should stand united for unrestricted access laws and not sell out just to get a bill passed! Disclosure veto legislation is unethical and unjust!



Please e-mail the New Jersey Assembly today and urge members to VOTE NO ON A1406/S799.

CONTACT INFORMATION

(write one letter, cut and paste for all)



AsmAlbano@njleg.org, AsmMilam@njleg.org, ASmDeAngelo@njleg.org, AsmGusciora@njleg.org, AsmChivukula@njleg.org, AsmEgan@njleg.org, AsmBarnes@njleg.org, AsmDiegnan@njleg.org, AsmCoughlin@njleg.org, AsmWisniewski@njleg.org, AsmCryan@njleg.org, AsmGreen@njleg.org, AsmMcKeon@njleg.org, AsmCaputo@njleg.org, AsmCoutinho@njleg.org, AsmBurzichelli@njleg.org, AsmMainor@njleg.org, AsmODonnell@njleg.org, AsmPrieto@njleg.org, AsmRamos@njleg.org, AsmGiblin@njleg.org,

AsmSchaer@njleg.org, AsmJohnson@njleg.org, AsmMoriarty@njleg.org, AsmWilson@njleg.org,AsmGreenwald@njleg.org, AsmConaway@njleg.org, ASmConners@njleg.org, AsmHolzapfel@njleg.org, AsmWolfe@njleg.org, AsmRible@njleg.org,AsmOScanlon@njleg.org, AsmThompson@njleg.org, AsmBiondi@njleg.org, AsmAmodeo@njleg.org, AsmPolistina@njleg.org, asmbramnick@njleg.org, AsmDiMaio@njleg.org, AsmPeterson@njleg.org, AsmChiusano@njleg.org, AsmBucco@njleg.org, AsmCarroll@njleg.org, AsmDeCroce@njleg.org, AsmWebber@njleg.org, AsmDancer@njleg.org, AsmMalone@njleg.org, AsmSchroeder@njleg.org, AsmRumana@njleg.org, AsmRusso@njleg.org, AsmDelany@njleg.org, AsmRudder@njleg.org, AsmRumpf@njleg.org,

AsmFuentes@njleg.org, AsmDiCicco@njleg.org, AswWatsonColeman@njleg.org,

AswQuijano@njleg.org, AswStender@njleg.org, AswJasey@njleg.org, AswTucker@njleg.org, AswSpencer@njleg.org, AswRiley@njleg.org, AswQuigley@njleg.org, AswRodriguez@njleg.org, AswOliver@njleg.org, AswEvans@njleg.org,AswPou@njleg.org, AswVainieriHuttle@njleg.org,

AswVoss@njleg.org, AswWagner@njleg.org, AswLampitt@njleg.org,

AswAngelini@njleg.org, AswCasagrande@njleg.org , AswHandlin@njleg.org,

AswCoyle@njleg.org, AswMunoz@njleg.org, AswMcHose@njleg.org, AswVandervalk@njleg.org,

AswGove@njleg.org