미국법상 입양승낙의 철회기간 = Special Issues : On the Withdrawal of consent in American Adoption Law

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Texas Adoption Law allows natural parents to withdraw arbitrarily their consent prior to the entry of a final decree of adoption without considering the child`s welfare. Prospective adoptive parents in Texas will presumably continue to argue this kind of formalistic law. If the legislatures in these jurisdictions continue to allow this practice, rapid discourage of adoptions and serious damage of child`s psychological well-being will occur. The best solution for this kind of states would be to create the best interests of the child standard. Some states which prohibit revocation except in cases of fraud or duress, obviously succeed in providing stability in adoptions. However, perhaps a very short cooling off period would be more compassionate for the natural parents who very often find it so difficult to consent to adoption and thus experience mixed feelings. Giving natural parents short cooling off period to revoke consent is certainly very limited. After that period, the consent would be irrevocable absent fraud or duress. There are many doubts whether jurisdictions prohibiting revocation except in cases of fraud or duress accomplish the goal of providing what is best for the child or not. Moreover, there could be cases, such as when the child is not yet in the adoptive home. In these cases, perhaps it would be a better alternative to allow natural parents to revoke consent if their child has not yet been placed in an adoptive home, and the parents can prove revocation would be in the child`s best interests. As long as those courts having the discretion to determine the child`s best interests base their decisions on the child`s psychological development, it appears that those decisions will bring about the best results for the children. Many states have greatly improved considering the child`s best interests in withdrawal of consent to adoption, but they still continue striving to accomplish what is best for the children.