The ultimate judgment of extraordinary appeal that was made by the Supreme Court concerning this case of litigation between adopted children and adoptive parents may restrain future judgments.  However, the grounds of the case stated or claimed in the original sentence were presented to competent official agencies for opinions pursuant to Article 17 of the Rules Governing the Adjudication of the Grand Justices Council.  The Supreme Court replied that the forgoing sentence is based on Yuan No.2747 (Judicial Yuan) and Interpretation No. 3004 (Judicial Yuan).  Furthermore, the Public Prosecutor’s Office for the Supreme Court replied that if the reasoning made in the forgoing sentence is the result of the explanations of the Judicial Yuan set prior to the enforcement of the Constitution (effective on October 25, 1946), it is necessary for the Judicial Yuan to provide an appropriate explanation in order to ensure that there will not be any ambiguities in legal terminologies afterwards. Due to questions about the forgoing explanations (Yuan No.2747 (Judicial Yuan)) and Interpretation No. 3004 (Judicial Yuan) set forth before the enforcement of the Constitution Law, we agreed that an explanation would be provided for this case according to a non-agenda proposal presented at the Ninth Council of the Grand Justices on August 16, 1952. 

       Under Article 967 of the Civil Code, adopted children and their biological parents and adopted children and their biological siblings are considered immediate and non-immediate family members, respectively.  Although Article 1077 of the Civil Code states that the relationship between adoptive parents and their adopted children is recognized as akin to that of a legal family member and his/her biological children, there is an additional legal requirement that the biological blood relations between adopted children and their biological parents remain intact. The relationship between biological parent and child will be recovered   upon the cessation of the relationship between adopted children and adoptive parents under Article 1083 of the Civil Code.  Since the natural blood relations between adoptive children and their biological parents can never be changed, the change from adoptive child status to biological child status results in the recovery of legal duties and responsibilities between adopted children and biological parents. 

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       When there is a conflict of interest in litigation between adopted children and adoptive parents, the biological parents of the adopted children can initiate litigation on behalf of the adoptive children under Article 582 of the Code of Civil Procedure.  As a result, the agent role of biological parents in litigation suggests that biological parents are likely to protect their adopted children’s legal interest in terms of relative regulations during the period of adoption.  In this case, Article 214 of Criminal Code provides that the victim’s immediate family can independently bring a suit against the tortfeasor, who has no reason to exclude the biological parents. Yuan No.2747 (Judicial Yuan) and Interpretation No. 3004 (Judicial Yuan) should be supplemented with an extensive explanation because their respective explanations only focused on the basis of the relationship between adopted children and their adoptive parents rather than the legal relationship between adopted children and their biological parents. 

*Translated by Lawrence L. C. Lee.