Mexico Supreme Court Upholds Gay Adoption Law

Adoption of children by gay couples is now legal in Mexico:

Mexico's Supreme Court voted Monday to uphold a Mexico City law allowing adoptions by same-sex couples, drawing jubilant cheers from gay advocacy groups and angry protests from Roman Catholic Church representatives.

The justices voted 9-2 against challenges presented by federal prosecutors and others who had argued the law fails to protect adoptive children against possible ill effects or discrimination, or to guarantee their right to a traditional family.

Mexico joins Argentina and Uruguay in allowing adoption by same-sex couples. That doesn't mean, however, that these countries will allow international adoption by same-sex couples.  But I wouldn't be all that surprised if that were to follow.

At one time, the conventional wisdom about international adoption by same-sex couples was that it was the sending country, not the U.S., who would be opposed:

However, conservative or religious countries (and often developing countries) may not be as receptive to gay and lesbian couples. Adoptive parents need to be aware that foreign governments and courts are making placement decisions based on their cultural standards and what they feel is in the best interest of the child.

The approval of same-sex marriage and adoption in these three conservative, Catholic countries seems to suggest that foreign countries are more open-minded that we expected.  And it's the U.S. Customs and Immigration Service that would likely be the stumbling block. That agency won't recognize same-sex marriages because of the Federal Defense of Marriage Act. 

Thus, a same-sex COUPLE could not get approval as a COUPLE.  Even if a foreign country would allow the adoption as a COUPLE, the immigration approval to bring an adopted child back to the U.S. would have to be done as a single adopting parent. 

And then there's the issue of whether a same-sex couple adoption from another country would be recognized in the U.S., which I've blogged about before.

So maybe potential sending countries like Mexico, Uruguay & Argentina, "making placement decisions based on their cultural standards and what they feel is in the best interest of the child," have a few things to teach us in the U.S.A.