Court Opinion

ID: 9457852
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 20:35:01.140296+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:35:32.169699
License: Public Domain

ALBERT V. BRYAN, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I would affirm the decision of the District Court on Judge Field’s opinion. Morris v. Richardson, 335 F.Supp. 1178 (S.D.W.Va. April 28, 1971). In the peculiar circumstances here, the regulation seems to me to be unwarrantably restrictive and arbitrary in excluding the adopting court from the statutory phrase “public child-placement agency”. The facts do not justify that interpretation of the statute in order to effectuate its terms.
There was no possibility of abuse of the law because the adoption of this child occurred before the benefits of the legislation were available to her foster parent. Moreover, it was too much to expect of him to anticipate any such infirmity in the child’s adoptive status. To require him to seek an out-of-the county agency when the State law demanded that the adoption be accomplished in the county of residence, was also unreasonable. The majority would *779have the grandfather “relinquish” the child to the State and thereafter endeav- or to adopt her. This seems to me to be well beyond the exaction of the statute.