Adoption Law

The NAF and its staff have been actively involved with efforts in Washington and elsewhere to achieve changes in adoption law and remove bureaucratic barriers to adoption.

• The Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, has made it dramatically easier to adopt a child from foster care.
• The Intercountry Adoption Act of 2000, raised the number of children available for adoption from other countries.
• The Child Health Act of 2000 has promoted greater emphasis on adoption as a choice for women facing unplanned pregnancies.
• Ratification of the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption and Passage of the Intercountry Adoption Act of 2000 provided the first consumer protections for families adopting abroad.
• The Child Citizenship Act of 2000 provides for automatic citizenship for children adopted abroad, saving adoptive families thousands of dollars and years of paperwork. It is estimated that over 100,000 children adopted in the US in the last 10 years became citizens for the first time when the law went into effect on February 27, 2001.

However, as more children are available for adoption, with less red tape, the reality is that more and more families are excluded financially from the adoption process. That's where NAF Financial Programs can help.

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Current Adoption Law Headlines

Law lets women give up newborns soon after birth (The Daily Sentinel)
Family Law (Law Society Gazette)
LEGISLATION: Highlights of paid leave (Courier-Post)
Jackson County News (MainStreet Newspapers)
Safety law should already be observed (Richfield Reaper)
Lost Twitter/chat transcript: "Cabin Fever" (Houston Chronicle)
Sex crime law OK'd (Inland Valley Daily Bulletin)
Moms Are Queens For A Day (Brandon News & Tribune)
Beacon Hill Roll Call: May 8 (Westwood Press)
Viet Nam will not renew US child-adoption agreement (Vi?t Nam News)

Links courtesy of Yahoo! News. To add these stories to My Yahoo! click here