American adoption agency vs. a american adoption attorney.?

Question

can someone tell me the differnces between going with an american adoption agency vs. an american adoption attorney. in detail if you have the time. thank you!

Answer 1

Hi Sabrina,

Here are a few differences & similarities:

In America, family law attorneys, or those specializing in adoption, can arrange the legal aspects of a private adoption.  Say for example, there is a step-parent adoption or another relative adoption of a child, an adoption attorney can usually handle that.  Say an expectant mother wants to relinquish her parental rights after the birth, and she and the father of the baby have a specific person or couple in mind to adopt their baby.  Adoption attorneys will also be familiar with ways of sidestepping father's rights, if necessary, in order to make an adoption happen.

That attorney is not going to be qualified to complete a home study for the prospective adoptive parents.  They will have to go elsewhere for that because it will be required before any judge can legally finalize an adoption in court.  That attorney is generally not going to go out and recruit pregnant women, although some do!

Agencies, on the other hand, like to be your "one stop shopping center" for adoptions.  They like to control every aspect of contact from the recruiting of pregnant women, advertsing of available children, the "counseling" of pregnant women, the matching up with other adoptive parents, approval of the PAPs, sometimes coming to the delivery room, mediating contact between the families for years to come, and facilitating (or not) reunions, etc.

What they both have in common is that both the attorneys and the adoption agencies ultimately have the adoptive parent as their real client.  That is who is paying the bills.  They are the customer, and efforts are made to fulfill their wants & needs above childrens' and natural families.  Adoption is a very lucrative business.  Although there may be some independent attorneys or agency attorneys who represent the child or natural mother, that would be the exception rather than the rule.  Some represent both parties, which is clearly a conflict of interest, again favoring the adoptive parents.

Hope this helps explain the differences and similarities.

julie j

reunited adoptee

Answer 2

As far as I know, an adoption agency can handle the entire thing and an attorney is there just to represent you in the process. An attorney who specializes in adoption might have some access to families who are interested in giving their child up for adoption but, most probably don't and if they do it's minimal. Their primary job is to protect your interest in the adoption process. For instance, if you found someone who is looking for parents for the baby they are having (on the internet or in the newspaper or somehow else on your own) -- you would then need to hire an attorney. If you use an agency you may not need to have a private attorney yourself. But the agency would certainly have an attorney (whose responsibility it is to represent the agency, not you) who would handle the legal side of the adoption. The agency also has access to birthmothers and is involved in the whole process of adoption. An attorney of yours would only be involved in the legal aspects of the adoption -- for instance, they would not really be involved in matching you with a potential baby, etc. The cost of using just an attorney and not an agency is of course far less than if you use an agency.

Answer 3

Attorneys are a lot more expensive and a lot less ethical!