THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY?

The Right to Privacy.

What exactly is this right? Is it even protected by the Constitution? There are many definitions of it. Each person has his own definition of it. I read in this article that our U.S. Senators and Representatives are being asked to reconsider what the definition of it should be. One particular part of the article really struck out at me. Interestingly enough, adoptees don't want financial nor private communication access to our natural parents information. We just want our original birth certificates.

Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, a deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguards people's private communications and financial information.

That is very interesting indeed. I have always heard that the right to privacy is about the right to be free from governmental intrusion. Yes for adoptees, natural parents and adoptive parents, that is exactly what the government is doing. They are interfering with our private lives.

This is what the Fourth Amendment states:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

As an adoptee, I don’t have the right to be secure in my papers and effects. The state laws in non adoptee access states do exactly this. They are violating my fourth amendment rights.

I found this here. It is more about reproductive rights and preventing the government from raiding the privacy of married couples.

The privacy doctrine of the 1920s gained renewed life in the Warren Court of the 1960s when, in Griswold v Connecticut (1965), the Court struck down a state law prohibiting the possession, sale, and distribution of contraceptives to married couples. Different justifications were offered for the conclusion, ranging from Court's opinion by Justice Douglas that saw the "penumbras" and "emanations" of various Bill of Rights guarantees as creating "a zone of privacy," to Justice Goldberg's partial reliance on the Ninth Amendment's reference to "other rights retained by the people," to Justice Harlan's decision arguing that the Fourteenth Amendment's liberty clause forbade the state from engaging in conduct (such as search of marital bedrooms for evidence of illicit contraceptives) that was inconsistent with a government based "on the concept of ordered liberty."

What exactly do these amendments state?

The Ninth Amendment states:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

The Fourteenth Amendment states:

No State shall... deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.

This came from that previously mentioned page.

The most frequently quoted statement by a Supreme Court justice on the subject of privacy comes in Justice Brandeis's dissent in Olmstead v. U. S. (1928): "The makers of our Constitution understood the need to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness, and the protections guaranteed by this are much broader in scope, and include the right to life and an inviolate personality -- the right to be left alone -- the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men. The principle underlying the Fourth and Fifth Amendments is protection against invasions of the sanctities of a man's home and privacies of life. This is a recognition of the significance of man's spiritual nature, his feelings, and his intellect."

Another quote from this same website:

Read Barron v Baltimore (1833). Barron settles the question of whether Bill of Rights guarantees that do not specifically limit their application to the federal government (The First Amendment, e.g., expressly says "Congress shall make no law...") might also protect citizens from the actions of state governments. The answer Chief Justice Marshall gives, in case involving an alleged taking of private property by Baltimore without compensation to the owner, is "No." The decision in the case was Marshall's last on the Court and, interestingly, Marshall cuts off his successor as chief justice, Roger B. Taney, before Taney has a chance to argue the case for Baltimore--Marshall believed that the argument for Barron had been sufficiently weak that there was no need to hear from the lawyer representing the city.

There has not ever been one piece of paperwork proving this so called natural parent right to privacy. Now they are stating that it was implied. They told the women, "to go on with their lives and to forget that this ever happened." It was implied on them. The women never forgot. The women for the most didn't go on with their lives. They weren't allowed to grieve their loss. It was a suck it up and drive on. What state legislators must realize is that this right to privacy is about the right for adoption agencies/attorneys to cover up their wrongs, their acts of coercion, and their acts of deception.

I have been researching adoption from all angles now. The question popped into my brain. How do prospective adoptive parents research an adoption agency? I know that Texas has its own website. It helps but how much is really buried? How much does Joe Public really get to see about adoption? What is Adoption Awareness Month really about? Is it about foster care adoption or is it about infant adoption?

I read this post on Paragraphien's blog. It is really enlightening. Some other very interesting reads. These are adoptive parents and prospective adoptive parents calling for adoption reform. All I can think is HOLY SHIT. These are just folks adopting from Vietnam. They are calling people to the mat. They are doing it with style and class that I truly respect and appreciate.

Pho for Four.
It Only Takes One Step To Begin A Journey.
Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.
Stepping On Legos.

Check the links to the side. They too get it. I need to add these folks as well. Adoption agencies and attorneys need to be AWARE because we are all issuing the Adoption BeWareness month to them.