Okla. Stat. tit. 10, § 10-7501-1.2: Purpose of Code

A. The Legislature of this state believes that every child

should be raised in a secure, loving home and finds that adoption is

the best way to provide a permanent family for a child whose

biological parents are not able or willing to provide for the

child's care or whose parents believe the child's best interest will

be best served through adoption. The purpose of the Oklahoma

Adoption Code is to:

1. Ensure and promote the best interests of the child in

adoptions and to establish an orderly and expeditious process for

movement of adoption matters through the courts;

2. Affirm that the parent-child relationship is fundamental and

that all adoption laws should be fair to the child and to each

parent of the child;

3. Affirm the duty of the biological parents to provide

appropriately for the care of the child unless custody of the child

has been transferred either voluntarily or involuntarily;

4. Affirm the duty of a noncustodial parent to:

a. provide financial support for the parent's biological

child, and otherwise exercise parental

responsibilities,

b. maintain a parent-child relationship, regardless of

the absence of any court order to that effect, and

c. provide for the appropriate financial support of the

mother of the child during her term of pregnancy;

5. Affirm the duty of a male person who has sexual relations

with a female person outside of marriage to be aware that a

pregnancy might occur;

6. Affirm the duty of the biological father of a child who is

to be born or who is born outside of marriage to exercise his

parental responsibilities for the child. This includes the duty to

inform himself about the existence and needs of any such child and

to exercise parental responsibilities toward that child even before

birth;

7. Encourage prebirth planning for adoption as a means of

facilitating adoption of a child into a permanent family as soon as

possible. To that end, the Oklahoma Adoption Code provides for a

prebirth notice of a plan for adoption and for procedures by which a

putative father may give his consent or otherwise respond to the

notice;

8. Ensure that children placed for adoption will be raised in

stable, permanent loving families whose qualifications for adoption

have been properly evaluated in light of the child's needs;

9. Promote and strengthen the integrity and finality of

adoptions by limiting the time and circumstances for a consent to be

withdrawn or a challenge to the adoption filed; and

10. Recognize the right of all children who have been adopted

to have access to information about their social and medical

history.

B. It is the intent of the Legislature to balance the privacy

rights of all parties to an adoption while clarifying when and to

whom information may be released. The Legislature seeks to promote

voluntary reunions, provide for confidential intermediaries, and

collect and maintain social and medical information relating to the

adoption in the recognition that all children should have access to

knowledge about their heritage.