United States

For many years the adoption of children from the USA has been one of our busiest adoption programs.  This comes as a surprise to many people.  At a time when many adoption programs around the world are closing or slowing down, U.S. adoptions remain a ray of sunshine for British Columbian residents.

On April 1, 2008 the US joined the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption.  This means that from that date onwards the USA must look first for parents within the USA before permitting these children to be adopted by Canadians or Europeans.  This requirement is called the Principle of Subsidiarity. 

For the first year under the Hague Convention there were no children who left the US for adoption to any country in the world.  Fortunately during that first year adoptions from the USA continued to BC, because many BC parents qualified to be grandfathered under the old rules.

During the first year under Hague rules the US Central Authority struggled with how to implement this Principle of Subsidiarity. That has now been worked out and adoptions can continue under this new system. This is good news for Canadian adopting parents. This timing is fortuitous since we are close to completing adoptions for all of our grandfathered clients.

There are 5 main steps under the new system: 

1. All parties must follow the procedures under the Hague Convention.
2. The birth mother must choose adopting parents in a manner consistent with the Principle of Subsidiarity. 
3. A judge in the United States must issue a Court Order that it is in the child's best interest to leave the USA for adoption.
4. The Hague Central Authority in the US must consent to the child leaving the USA.
5. The Hague Central Authority in B.C. must give its permission to the adoption and issue a Letter of Agreement to Canada Immigration.

These steps cover the majority of U.S. Hague adoptions but there are exceptions for special circumstances such as relative adoptions.

For more information about adoption from the United States, contact us: