[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 15]
[Senate]
[Page 21187]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                       TRIBUTE TO KOREAN ADOPTEES

  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I feel compelled to say something about 
a special group of people. There is a wonderful gathering of people in 
Washington. As you know, we have hundreds and thousands of people who 
come every week to Washington. We cannot come to the floor to talk 
about every group that comes to Washington because then we would be on 
the floor for a long time.
  But there is a very special group in Washington, and it is a group of 
400 Korean American, American Korean adults who were adopted from Korea 
in the 1950s and 1960s.
  I will read from a wonderful article that appeared in USA Today 
yesterday about one particular orphan and her experience. But I want to 
say how proud I am, as cochair of the Adoption Caucus, to host, with 
many Members of this body, this gathering of Americans who have come, 
actually, from all over the world--it is not just Korean adoptees from 
America but from Europe and other places who were adopted out of 
Korea--to share their stories.
  This is one story by war orphan No. 1371. She is a writer for USA 
Today at this time in her life. She writes:

       Malnutrition and a bacterial infection had drawn all but 8 
     pounds from my 24-inch frame. My thick black hair teemed with 
     lice; my body glistened with circles of fresh infection 
     created by oozing sores that covered 80% of my body.
       Yet somehow I survived. Less than two months later, I was 
     packed onto a shiny airliner with 96 other Korean children--
     four to a wicker basket--and carried to my adoptive parents, 
     Dominic and Dorothy Enrico, in southern California.
       At that moment I suffered what now seems like 
     incomprehensible losses for one so young: my birth family, my 
     country and the comfortable anonymity of growing up among 
     people of the same race. What I gained was the opportunity to 
     participate in an international adoption revolution that 
     continues to be a testimony to the human potential for love 
     and acceptance regardless of blood ties, race or ethnicity.

  This young woman will join 400 other adults who have had this 
experience. And there have been over 140,000 young people--infants and 
young children and teenagers--adopted from Korea, and many of them have 
come to the United States. In almost every instance, it has been a 
happy and joyful experience for the adoptee and for the family.
  The Korean adoptions have opened up a new thought in America: that 
families could be made of a people who looked different--because love 
does not know a color; love does not know family bounds.
  So because of the great work of the Government and Catholic Charities 
and many others that have made this possible, we now have families in 
America that look very different with family members who love others 
from different parts of the world and from different races. It is a 
testimony to the greatness of the human potential for love and for 
companionship.
  I am proud to sponsor this group of adults. We hope to continue the 
work of international adoption. We would like to find a home for every 
child in the world in the country in which they were born. But if there 
is not a home there--if no one wants them, if they are not able to find 
a home--then we need to find them a home somewhere in the world.
  Senator Jesse Helms, an adoptive father himself, which a lot of 
people do not know--he and his wife adopted a special needs child, so 
he has personal experience in adoption--is the lead sponsor of a 
tremendous piece of legislation that is going to lay an international 
framework, a legal framework, so children from all over the world, 
including the United States, can find a home and they will not have to 
grow up infested with lice or they will not have to have a little body 
oozing with sores, so they will have a mother and a father, preferably 
two parents. But if we could find one caring adult for each child in 
the world, that is our hope.
  So that is one of the great gatherings that is taking place. I wanted 
to honor them by reading from that article this morning and by wishing 
them a wonderful conference at the J.W. Marriott. We will be hosting a 
reception for them in the Capitol later today.
  I invite my colleagues to drop by and see for themselves the great 
miracle of adoption.

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