Should Adoptees be bound by the same rules as everyone else concerning Grandpartent Visitation laws?

Question

This is something I wondered about after reading a recent news article. I would appreciate your thoughts.

Most states have enacted Grandparent Visitation Laws to ensure grandparents can visit with their grandchildren.

Should adoptees be subject to these laws also? Imagine an adoptee who is estranged from her adoptive parents (pick your own reason). Moreover, our adoptee does not want these people to be in her life or her young son's. Consequently, the boy has never met, seen pictures, or heard about them. Although the boy has no connection with them either by blood or interaction, should his mother still be made to follow the Grandparent Visitation Laws like everyone else?

This is a moral question not a legal one.

Answer 1

My son's maternal grandmother just got out of prison and has her own 11 year old son who is in foster care. Yet, at one point, she thought she should have rights to my son. Oh, and did I mention my son's natural father is her drug dealer. Did I mention that my son's natural mother grew up in foster care? My son's natural mother should decide who has rights to her child and she did not want her mother to have anything to do with him. So no, I don't think it should be a given that grandparents should automatically have rights to their adopted grandchildren.

Answer 2

Once you adopt a child... it is your child.  So, all of the rules that apply to biological children also apply to your adopted child.

Note, my parents have several adopted children (not just ours) and have always loved those children just as much as their biological grandchildren.

Answer 3

Why wouldn't they be?  The adoptive parents are the parents of the adoptee, and, therefore, the grandparents of the adoptee's children.  If such laws exist, there is no reason they wouldn't apply in such a case.

Answer 4

It would fall into open adoption category I would think and not everyone who adopts a child includes biological extended family in the open adoption.

I suppose it would depend on what kind of contact they were wanting and to what degree of contact. If they were wanting.  In most open adoptions it is usually only the biological parents who may request photos, cards at bdays/holidays, phone calls, emails, etc.. with the family.  

To be honest about your question though, NO, in adoption cases I don't think the law should apply the same way. When the child was legally relinquished at the adoption hearing and at finalization into the adoptive family then all ties to the biological family are severed as the judged proclaims them a permanent member of the adoptive family.  It is different if the child was living in a foster type situation during the adoption wtih the bio. grandparents and they asked for some form of contact after finalization in form of photos or letters occassionally but it would have to be a very specific case like that.

Answer 5

Yes, I do.  Even though the family is estranged, they are still related in that the adoption formed a family.  Therefore, it is not right to keep the child and grandparents apart from one another, unless the grandparents were a threat to the child, of course.

Now, Tobit, I know this is supposed to be only a moral question, but I can't resist hitting on the legal just a tad, anyway, particularly since the previous answer states that adoptees are subject to the same laws as everyone else.  So, legally speaking, adoptive families are legal families, subject to the same laws and rights as all other families.  

Adopted persons should be treated the same under the law as all other citizens.  Currently, they are not treated equally in 44 states with regard to accessing their own birth records.  They are the only citizens in these states than cannot unconditionally access their own factual birth records.

If adopted persons are to be subject to the same laws as non-adopted persons, then they should be subject to the same rights as well.  A person's adoptive status should not affect his or her rights.

Edit:

Although adoption forms a family by imposition of law, and the adopted person had no say in the adoption, the adopted person's offspring and other members of the family cannot be expected to lose the rights of the legal relationships formed by the adoption, even if the adopted person does not wish to be part of the family any longer.  

It becomes a point of ethics if at some point if the adopted person chooses to be adopted by another person in order to become legally severed from the adoptive family. (Most states have some type of legal provision by which adults can adopt other adults.)  At that point, I do not believe that the grandparents would fall into the category of receiving any protection of laws regarding grandparents' right, since the legal grandparent-grandchild relationship no longer exists.

It is still ethical, however, for the adopted person to allow the now  former grandparents the right to see the child.  Although no analogy is perfect, I will compare it to a husband and wife divorcing.  If the wife had a child from a previous marriage, that child would be the current husband's stepchild, but not his legal child.  If the couple divorces, there is no legal tie between the child and the former stepfather, it is still ethical for the mother to honor the relationship formed by the marriage.

Answer 6

When the child is adopted the bio grandparents are not legally the grandparents anymore. The adopted parents and their family's are their  family now.  In alot of states they have done away with the grandparents law anyway and put it back in the parents hands who the child can see. Unless the adoptive parents actually know the birth parents they wouldn't know any of their family. And the records are not made available to the bio  gp. As far as the adopted grandparents they would have the rights to file if they chose to. As they became the child's grandparents when the adoption took place. I now people don't want to hear this, but it is the truth.

Answer 7

I'm confused.  An adoptee is subject to the same laws as everybody else.  Therefore the parents have the same grandparents rights as anybody else.

Keep in mind that while there may be a law on the books, many judges do not enforce grandparent laws unless the child already had a substantial relationship with them (such as living with grandparent for extended period).  

Ultimately and morally, if the parent does not want the child to have contact with the grandparent, then that is their parental choice.

Answer 8

Um, yes I do believe they should have equal grandparent visitation rights