Opinion ID: 1473555
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Preliminary Observation: How To Conceptualize This Case

Text: As indicated in the statement of facts and proceedings, although Bruce and Mark were living together at the time Hillary joined them, Bruce alone petitioned for Hillary's adoption, which the court granted. Later, in a partially redundant exercise, both Bruce and Mark petitioned to adopt Hillary, and Bruce, in addition, formally consented to Mark's joining in the petition. As will become clear from our statutory analysis, this particular approach reflects an understandable effort to cover all the bases, so to speak, in advocating the eligibility of an unmarried couple to adopt a child in the District of Columbia. In reality, therefore, despite Bruce's initial, separate adoption of Hillary, the parties seek a way for them jointly to adopt her, and that is how we conceptualize this case. For reasons that we shall explain more fully once the statutory framework and related issues become more focused, this case is not better interpreted, more narrowly, as a petition filed by a single, unmarried person, Mark, seeking to adopt Hillary while using Bruce's consent to preserve Bruce's preexisting parental rights. The result should be the same whether members of an unmarried couple living together in a committed personal relationship seek to adopt sequentially or simultaneously. This, then, is the perspective from which we viewand decidethe case.