A Father’s Struggle to Stop His Daughter’s Adoption
In the United States, when an unmarried man has a baby, his partner can give it up without his consent unless he happens to know about an obscure system called the responsible father registry. Christopher Emanuel / The Atlantic
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Christopher Emanuel first met his girlfriend in the fall of 2012, when they were both driving forklifts at a warehouse in Trenton, South Carolina. She was one of a handful of women on the job; she was white and he was black. She ignored him at first, and Emanuel saw it as a challenge. It took multiple attempts to get her phone number. He says he “wasn’t lonely, but everybody wants somebody. Nothing wrong with being friends.”