In the early 20th Century, states began to pass laws that required that adoption be private. Birth certificates and adoption records were closed. This meant that information about a child's birth history and birth family could not be given to the adopting parents or to the child, even when he or she grew up.

Most people born after the early 1950s and until the 1970s grew up with the idea that closed adoption was normal. When a child was adopted, his or her original (first) birth certificate was changed and a new (amended) birth certificate was issued to show that the child's adoptive parents were his or her legal parents. (This is still the practice today.) With few exceptions, a child who was adopted could not get a copy of his or her original birth certificate.

Adoption professionals of that time believed that closed adoption records would be helpful for all concerned, allowing birth parents, adoptive parents and the children they adopted to go on with their lives in the best possible way.

However, by the mid-1960s society was changing. Birth mothers who at the time their babies were born felt ashamed that they had become pregnant without being married, were acknowledging that they thought often about the children they placed for adoption and were very sad at not knowing how they were growing up. Many adoptees began to voice their need to know more about their roots; indeed, many demanded the information they believed was their birthright. And understanding adoptive parents wanted to help their children find the peace they needed.

More adults who had been adopted as children returned to adoption agencies to ask for information about their birth parents and their history. These same adult adoptees wanted to help make changes in the way future adoptions were performed and began to work for adoption reform. As a result, the concept of open adoption was born, and a movement to "unseal" adoption records began. Today, four states: Alabama, Alaska, Kansas and Oregon, permit adult adoptees to have unrestricted (open) access to their original birth certificate.

And in five other states--Maryland, Montana, Ohio, Indiana and Virginia--adult adoptees born before or after a particular year have the same unrestricted access. For instance, in Maryland, an adoptee can access his or her original birth certificate if he or she was born before 1947; in Virginia, an adoptee can have access only if he or she was born after 1994.