Intercountry Reform Act of 2003 ("ICARE")

The ICARE bill currently before Congress has two distinct purposes. The first is in regard to the citizenship rights of children adopted abroad and the manner in which those children enter the United States. The second establishes a national Office of Intercountry Adoption within the U.S. State Department that will be headed by an Ambassador at Large who is appointed by the President.

The parts of the bill dealing with the citizenship rights of the children are commendable and beyond debate. They take much needed actions that are long overdue not only to ease the process for adoptive families, but also to establish a precedent that children adopted abroad share all the legal rights and privileges of biological and domestically adopted children. This part of the bill also takes an important step by agreeing to consider allowing children with two living parents to be adoptable. It is this part of the bill that has caused some adoption advocates and NGOs to call it "An Adoptive Parent's Dream Come True".

The reality is that the best interests of the adoptive community would be best served if this bill were split into two distinctive pieces of legislation. This is because of the aspects of the bill dealing with the establishment of an Office on Intercountry Adoption. While the creation of such an office is not at issue and may well be necessary, this bill as currently written raises more questions than it provides answers. The powers, funding, objectives, and policies of the office are extremely vague and could thus lead to significant changes that might limit children's opportunity to find a forever family through intercountry adoption.

Some specific issues:

• It is unclear about how this office would function in relation to the Central Authority being established for purposes of the Hague Treaty implementation. It appears as though this new office would usurp the Central Authority and could cause a scenario common in other countries where all intercountry adoptions are treated the same, whether or not the adoption is bound by the Hague. This would contradict what the adoption community has been told for quite some time would be the case in the US.
• The bill does not address guidelines or standards that will be used to create regulations to protect "the rights of the child". As we all know, there is much debate on how doctrines like the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Hague Treaty are interpreted and without clarification on this, an amazing amount of power will lie in how the Ambassador at Large subjectively interprets these rights. This could cause, for example, countries to close for ICA that strongly protect the civil rights of women in allowing them to place a child for ICA without an extended or formal search for family members or a domestic family.
• The bill refers to the office recognizing adoptions that are legalized by a "Competent Authority" in the child's country of origin. The term "Competent Authority" is not specific and would thus create ambiguity. For example, it is not clear how the office would view a country that, like the United States, allows adoptions to be completed with a civil rather than judicial system.
• The funding stream is not clear. The bill does not earmark how the new office will receive its budget. This stands to put ICA at the mercy of political budget battles. The bill should explicitly state that fees charged by the office be directly earmarked for the services provided by the office.

In short, while we applaud the spirit of the bill, it needs much more work before we can offer our support of it. As the bill is currently written, it will place an enormous amount of authority in the hands of a political appointee of the President. This in itself has the potential to create many nightmare scenarios. It could result in significant changes to the ICA system every time we have a change in administrations. It also could very easily cause the ICA process, and the innocent children finding families, to become victims in a politicized world. As an example, if the Ambassador at Large who is beholden to the President has the authority to make changes based on subjective opinion, there would be nothing to stop ICA from being held hostage if the US has a trade dispute with or wants the military support of another country. It is exactly this type of political pressure that has led Romania, for example, to create laws that stand to essentially end ICA altogether.

Focus on Adoption fully acknowledges and appreciates Senator Nickles's and Senator Landrieu's significant contributions and support of adoption, and hope that modified legislation will be developed which can be implemented effectively, provide equity to adopted children born abroad, and preserve and increase the opportunity for children in need of families to gain permanency through intercountry adoption. With so many children in third world countries dieing prematurely or suffering from a lack of healthcare, education, and basic nurture, such legislation is badly needed.

Links to perspectives on this bill:

Focus on Adoption's comments to Senators Landrieu and Nickles

Reaching Out Through International Adoption's analysis of the bill

Presentation given to Rep. Zoe Lofgren by Bay Area Guatemalan Adoptive Parents

Press Release issued by Focus on Adoption

Information on the bills:

Senate Version:

Docket Name: S.3031

To read the bill, go to http://thomas.loc.gov and query on S 3031.

Current status: 12/7/2004 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.

Members of the Committee on the Judiciary (click on name to link to the Senator's Site):

House Version:

Docket name: H.R.3896

Link to the text: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=108_cong_bills&docid=f:h3896ih.txt.pdf

Current Status: 4/2/2004 Referred to House subcommittee. Status: Referred to the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims. (part of the House committee on Judiciary)

Members of the Subcommitee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims (click on name to link to the Representative's site):

Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Claims
Mr. John N. Hostettler, Chairman 8th district, Indiana
B-370B Rayburn HOB, Tel: 202-225-5727