by Laura A. Cecere

About the author: Laura A. Cecere, an attorney, social worker, and single adoptive mother of two, is the founder and executive director of China Seas Adoption Services, an organization that provides assistance to Americans seeking to adopt children from China.

Editor’s note: The following statement was issued in response to hearings in Congress in October 1999 regarding legislation to implement the Hague Convention, a 1993 international treaty that sets standards and rules for international adoptions.

We are here today representing the thousands upon thousands of deliriously happy American parents who have adopted children abroad. We are the thousands of Americans each year who have used the current system of foreign adoption smoothly and effectively, with minimal interference by the federal government. We found the system to...