James Hamilton: Rest in Peace

June 24, 2024

James M. Hamilton, after a heroic battle with cancer, passed peacefully at his home in St. Paul, Minnesota on Tuesday, June 18.  Jim was our friend and ally, a husband and father, a lawyer, a world traveler, and adoptee rights and adoption reform soldier. An honorary Bastard God…Jim was our friend. He always had time to talk to people . He opened his home and his heart to his extended adoption-related family and to us.  He believed in us. His friendship, support, and work gives the lie to the “evil adopter” trope that a certain band of online adopted people carry. He loved us and we loved him. Hopefully, we are all a little smarter and even nicer because of Jim.

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Minnesota: OBCs Open on July 1. Join the Run-up Events!

June 11, 2024

July 1 is just around the corner –and Minnesota adoptees will be able to obtain their Original Birth Certificates.  No exceptions. No conditions. This has been a long time coming . The law that kept OBCs  sealed was the most complicated convoluted secret and sealed records system in the US. Minnesota-based Greg Luce, founder and director of the Adoptee Rights Law Center and the Minnesota Coalition for Adoptee Rights navigated the 2023 campaign that cracked the vault. Two events are scheduled to explain, educate, and celebrate the new law.

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Minnesota Becomes 15th State to Acknowledge Adoptee Birth Record Equality

May 25, 2023

Minnesota’s long history of sealed records and complicated, confusing, convoluted “rules,” including an incomprehensible intermediary system that made it nearly impossible for adoptees to obtain their Original Birth Certificates, ended Wednesday when Minnesota Governor Tim Waltz signed  SF2995 an omnibus health bill that contained OBC access provisions. Those provisions came from the earlier stand-alone SF279 stuck in the Senate Health and Human Services Committee for carryover to the next session. The Minnesota Coalition for Adoption Reform (MCAR)  and the Adoptee Rights Law Center directed by Minneapolis attorney Gregory Luce, negotiated with legislative leaders to get the provisions added and onto the floor of both Houses which passed the bill on May 22, 2023, the last day of the session. (Senate: 34-32; House 69-64) 

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