Adoption

U.S. Readoption Explained

By Jeanne Trudeau Tate

Most adoption professionals recommend that adoptive parents readopt their child if their state laws permit them to do so. Readoption is the legal process of adopting a child again in the United States, after the child has been lawfully adopted in another country. In a readoption, the adoptive parents, once back in the U.S., petition the court in their state of residence to adopt their child in accordance with the laws of their state.

Two fundamental pre-requisites exist for the completion of a re-adoption. First, the child must be lawfully adopted under the laws of the foreign country where the adoption was pursued. Second, the adoptive parents must satisfy U.S. immigration requirements so that the child may lawfully enter the United States. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Bureau, a Federal agency, will recognize a valid foreign adoption, but only for the purpose of authorizing the immigration of the child into the U.S.

One of the main benefits of readoption is to secure the recognition of a legal parent-child relationship under U.S. law, thus eliminating reliance on the ongoing validity of the adoption laws of the foreign country. Whether a state recognizes a foreign adoption decree or not, readoption is a practical means of documenting the parent/child relationship under U.S. law. A recent state law case brought the significance of this security into sharp focus. In that case, a biological sibling attempted to block his adopted sibling’s ability to inherit from their parents on grounds that his brother had been adopted in another country but never adopted in the U.S. pursuant to U.S. law.

Readopting a child in the United States has benefits beyond assuring inheritance rights. It can be important if relations deteriorate between the U.S. and the child’s birth country and the foreign decree is brought into question. Another benefit may be the ability to obtain a state birth certificate. States that recognize foreign adoption decrees often permit adoptive parents to obtain a birth certificate from the Office of Vital Records in their state of residence. For states that either allow adoptive parents to readopt, or require them to do so, the readoption procedure, much like a domestic adoption petition, will result in the creation of a state issued birth certificate. For example, the State of Florida permits adoptive parents to readopt their foreign-born child. As a result of this process, the Florida Department of Vital Records will issue a Florida birth certificate, called a Certificate of Foreign Birth, memorializing the child’s legal name, date of birth and foreign place of birth and reflecting the adoptive parents as the parents of the child. Through readoption, a child adopted overseas can obtain an English language vital statistics record that establishes the child’s date of birth, place of birth, and legal name.

It is important to distinguish the readoption of a child from the finalization of an adoption that emanates from an award of guardianship in another country. In certain countries, such as Korea and India, adoptive parents, or a U.S. child-placing agency, receive guardianship over a child who then enters the U.S. with an IR4 visa. In such cases, the adoptive parents must file a petition for adoption in the U.S. so as to establish their parental rights. Such cases are not readoptions, since there is no underlying final adoption in the foreign country.

It is also important to remember that the readoption of a child in the U.S. is separate and distinct from the child’s acquisition of citizenship. A Federal law that went into effect in February 2001 confers automatic citizenship on children adopted abroad by U.S. citizens, i.e., those who, because of their finalized adoption in the foreign country, enter the U.S. on IR3 visas. Children who enter the U.S. on IR4 visas (i.e., with only a guardianship award to the intended adoptive parents) become U.S. citizens only upon adoption in the U.S. Parents should note, however, that even with “automatic” citizenship (1) it is necessary to apply for a certificate of citizenship to document U.S. citizenship, and (2) U.S. citizenship does not create a “U.S. adoption.”