Fox, Matter of
| Decision Date | 21 June 1977 |
| Docket Number | No. 49184,49184 |
| Citation | 567 P.2d 985,1977 OK 126 |
| Parties | In the Matter of Visitation Rights of Pauline FOX with Grandchildren, Tonya Marie Partin and Christopher Lee Partin, minor children. |
| Court | Oklahoma Supreme Court |
Appeal from the District Court of Tulsa County; Patricia Hoebel, judge.
Appellant appeals from order of the trial court granting visitation rights to the maternal grandmother over the objection of the adoptive parents of the minor children. REVERSED.
Bruce Peterson, Tulsa, for appellants.
George M. Park, Broken Arrow, for appellee.
This is an appeal from a judgment granting visitation rights to Pauline Fox, the maternal grandmother of Tonya Marie Partin and Christopher Lee Partin, minor children, who were adopted by appellants, Ralph Willard Partin and Lola Clark Partin.
Larry Wayne Partin and Mary Kathleen Partin, nee Hill, were married, and of that marriage two children were born: Tonya Marie Partin, October 18, 1967, and Christopher Lee Partin, July 1, 1969. The parents were divorced, and the mother was awarded custody of the two children. Subsequently, the mother was killed in an automobile accident on December 19, 1970.
In February, 1971, the district court of Tulsa County, Juvenile and Family Relations Division, awarded custody of the children to Ralph Willard Partin and Lola Clark Partin, paternal grandparents, and parents of the children's father. At the time of his former wife's death, the children's father was unemployed and living with his parents. Pauline Fox, the maternal grandmother, applied for visitation rights with her grandchildren, and visitation rights were granted by the court. Larry Wayne Partin remarried, and on May 9, 1975, consented to have his parental rights terminated. He executed a consent to adoption by his parents of his children. The children were legally adopted by Ralph Willard Partin and Lola Clark Partin May 19, 1975. On August 7, 1975, Pauline Fox filed an application for visitation rights with Tonya Marie Partin and Christopher Lee Partin, under the provisions of 10 O.S.1975 Supp. § 5. 1 The district court of Tulsa County held that 10 O.S.1975 Supp. § 5 was applicable even though the grandchildren were legally adopted under the provisions of 10 O.S.1971 § 60.1, et seq., and permitted visitation rights by Pauline Fox.
The appellants assert that the legal adoption of a minor child pursuant to the Uniform Adoption Act, 10 O.S.1971 § 60.1, et seq., terminates the possible visitation rights afforded the parents of a deceased parent of a minor child under the provisions of 10 O.S.1975 Supp. § 5. We agree.
The purpose of adoption proceedings is to terminate all legal relationships and rights between a minor child and its natural parents, and to establish these rights in the adoptive parents. We have recognized that there are, however, no statutory provisions limiting an adopted child's statutory right to inherit from its natural parent. 2 A decree of adoption severs the child from its own family tree and engrafts it upon that of the new parentage. Public policy requires the severance of all old ties. 3 The effect of adoption is to readjust a fundamental human relationship, and to establish a family status at law 4 with all the legal consequences, obligations and incidents arising and growing out of the status of natural parent and child. Where the adoption statute 5 accords the adopted child the status of a natural child and frees the natural parents of legal obligations toward it, a court in granting an adoption decree is without authority to include a grant of visitation privileges to the parent or members of the parent's family in the decree. 6
Kansas has similar statutes to 10 O.S.1975 Supp. § 5 and 10 O.S.1971 § 60.16. The Kansas Supreme Court in Browning v. Tarwater, 215 Kan. 501, 524 P.2d 1135 (1974) held that the adoption statute controls over the statute granting visitation rights to the parent of a deceased father of an unmarried minor child. The Court reasoned that to interpret the statute otherwise would mean that an adoptive parent would be subjected to the influence of a third person concerning his adopted child, which would not be conducive to the best interest of the child. The Court held that adoption had the effect of prohibiting the grandmother from exercising visitation rights because a child, when adopted, has new parents and grandparents.
Under the statute, 10 O.S.1971 § 60.16, the adoptive parents are entitled to exercise all the rights of natural parents. Thus, whether the natural grandmother, Pauline Fox, can continue visitation with the children is within the discretion of the children's adoptive parents. While we sympathize with the considerations which lead the trial court to grant visitation rights in this case, the compassion shown by the trial judge must give way to the new family union which the law has created. The severance by adoption must be complete. Although the new parents are...
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