Alvarez v. Shalala

• Decision Date: 31 August 1999
• Docket Number: Nos. 98-2382,98-2479,s. 98-2382
• Citation: 189 F.3d 598
• Parties: (7th Cir. 1999) CITY DANIEL ALVAREZ, SR., Commissioner of Human Services, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, and MORRIS I. SINELNIKOV, MAXIMINIA CARMONA, IGNACIA OROZCO, et al., Intervenor-Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. DONNA E. SHALALA, Secretary of Health and Human Services, JOHN J. CALLAHAN, Acting Commissioner of Social Security, DANIEL R. GLICKMAN, Secretary of Agriculture, et al., Defendants-Appellees
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 598

189 F.3d 598 (7th Cir. 1999)

CITY DANIEL ALVAREZ, SR., Commissioner of Human Services, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, and MORRIS I. SINELNIKOV, MAXIMINIA CARMONA, IGNACIA OROZCO, et al., Intervenor-Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. DONNA E. SHALALA, Secretary of Health and Human Services, JOHN J. CALLAHAN, Acting Commissioner of Social Security, DANIEL R. GLICKMAN, Secretary of Agriculture, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

Nos. 98-2382, 98-2479

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit

Argued April 1, 1999

Decided August 31, 1999

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. No. 97 C 4884--Blanche M. Manning, Judge. [Copyrighted Material Omitted] Before HARLINGTON WOOD, JR., RIPPLE and KANNE, Circuit Judges.

RIPPLE, Circuit Judge.

The City of Chicago, along with several city officials and an intervenor class of legal permanent residents, brought suit against the Secretary of Health and Human Services and other federal officers to challenge certain provisions of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, Pub. L. No. 104-193, 110 Stat. 2105 (1996) ("the Welfare Reform Act" or "the Act"), that restrict certain noncitizens' eligibility for welfare benefits. The plaintiffs alleged that the provisions of the Act that disqualify most legal aliens from receiving Food Stamps, Supplemental Security Income ("SSI"), and other welfare benefits violate the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause. The district court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss, and the plaintiffs appeal. For the reasons set forth in the following opinion, we affirm the judgment of the district court.

I BACKGROUND

A. The Welfare Reform Act

The Welfare Reform Act significantly restricted the eligibility of noncitizens lawfully in the United States to receive welfare benefits. See Pub. L. No. 104-193, 110 Stat. 2105, 2262-64 (1996).¹ Section 402(a) of the Act provides that, subject to certain exceptions, "qualified alien[s]" are not eligible to receive SSI or Food Stamp benefits. 8 U.S.C. sec. 1612(a) (1998).² As defined in sec. 431 of the Act, qualified aliens include permanent resident aliens, asylees, refugees, aliens who are paroled into the United States, aliens whose deportation is being withheld, aliens who have been granted conditional entry, certain Cuban and Haitian entrants, and certain "battered" aliens. See id. sec. 1641.³

Section 402(a)(2) enumerates several exceptions that allow various sub-groups within the qualified alien population to remain eligible for SSI, Food Stamps, or both. Refugees, asylees, aliens whose deportation is being withheld, certain Cuban and Haitian entrants, and certain Amerasian immigrants remain eligible for 7 years after the date they are admitted to the United States or are granted the relevant status. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(A). Permanent resident aliens who have worked for 40 qualifying quarters, as well as aliens who are veterans or on active duty (and their spouses and dependent children), retain their eligibility for the benefits. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(B), (C). Aliens lawfully residing in the United States who were receiving SSI benefits as of the date of enactment (August 22, 1996) retain their eligibility for SSI. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(E).⁴ Aliens who were receiving Food Stamps on the date of enactment remained eligible thereafter for a limited grace period, which is now over. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(D)(ii). Aliens who were lawfully residing in the United States on the date of enactment retain eligibility for SSI if they are blind or disabled and for Food Stamps if they are "receiving benefits or assistance for blindness or disability" within the meaning of the Food Stamp Act of 1977. Id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(F). Members of Indian tribes, as defined in 25 U.S.C. sec. 450b(e), and certain American Indians born in Canada remain eligible for the benefits. See 8 U.S.C. sec. 1612(a)(2)(G). Aliens who received SSI benefits after July 1996 on the basis of an application filed before January 1, 1979, also retain eligibility for SSI. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(H). Aliens who were either 65 or older or under 18, and were lawfully residing in the United States on the date of enactment, remain eligible for Food Stamps. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(I), (J). Finally, certain Hmong and Highland Laotians who are lawfully residing in the United States, and their spouses and dependent children, remain eligible for Food Stamps. See id. sec. 1612(a)(2)(K).

In sec. 402(b) of the Act, Congress authorized the states, subject to certain exceptions, to determine the eligibility of qualified aliens for three other federal benefit programs: Temporary Assistance for Needy Families ("TANF"), Social Services Block Grants ("SSBG"), and Medicaid. See id. sec. 1612(b). The exceptions to this provision, enumerated in sec. 402(b)(2), are similar to the exceptions in sec. 402(a)(2) and provide that certain subgroups are eligible for the designated federal programs.

B. Proceedings in the District Court

The City of Chicago and several city officials (collectively, "the City") brought suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief against five federal officers ("the defendants"). The City alleged that the provisions of the Welfare Reform Act that disqualify noncitizens lawfully in the United States from the various federally funded welfare programs violate the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause and the Older Americans Act.⁵ Subsequently, a number of legal permanent residents of the United States and an organization of ethnic associations with members who are legal permanent residents (collectively, "the intervenors") filed a motion to intervene, a motion for class certification, a class action complaint,⁶ and a motion for preliminary injunction. The district court granted the intervenors' requests for class certification and for intervention.⁷ The defendants filed separate motions to dismiss the City's and the intervenors' complaints. The district court granted the motions to dismiss. The City and the intervenors appeal.

C. Holding of the District Court

The district court granted the defendants' Rule 12(b)(6) motions to dismiss the City's and the intervenors' complaints and denied as moot the plaintiffs' motions for preliminary injunction. The court first held that the City lacked standing to bring a claim under the Older Americans Act and therefore dismissed that claim.⁸ The court did not address the City's standing to bring a constitutional challenge to the Welfare Reform Act because it found that it had jurisdiction to reach the merits of the same claim by the intervenors.

Turning to the intervenors' claims, the court held that the claims of the SSI class and the Food Stamp claims of the non-SSI class were barred by res judicata.⁹ The court then addressed the merits of the remaining claim--a constitutional challenge to the Welfare Reform Act brought by those non-SSI class members asserting TANF, SSBG, and Medicaid claims. Applying rational basis scrutiny, the court concluded that the Welfare Reform Act bears a rational relationship to several of Congress' stated goals, including encouraging self- sufficiency among immigrants, preventing public benefits from serving as an incentive to immigrate, and easing the burden on the public welfare system. The court therefore granted the defendants' motions to dismiss and denied as moot the plaintiffs' motions for preliminary injunction.

II DISCUSSION

The plaintiffs appeal three issues: whether the City has standing to challenge the constitutionality of the Welfare Reform Act, whether the district court erred in ruling that certain plaintiffs' claims are barred by res judicata, and whether the Welfare Reform Act is unconstitutional. As an initial matter, we note that we have jurisdiction to review the merits of the constitutional challenge without reaching the issues of the City's standing or res judicata. There is no dispute that the intervenors who have been rendered ineligible for benefits have standing to challenge the constitutionality of the Act. Thus, the district court had jurisdiction to adjudicate the merits of the constitutional claim, see Bowsher v. Synar, 478 U.S. 714, 721 (1986), and indeed did so. We therefore have jurisdiction to review the district court's final judgment. We note further that the district court's decision to rely on res judicata as to some of the plaintiffs does not affect our ability to review the merits of the constitutional challenge. See Maguire v. Thompson, 957 F.2d 374, 376, 379 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 822 (1992) (affirming, on the merits, the district court's dismissal of a claim challenging the constitutionality of a statute, without reviewing the district court's alternative holding that res judicata barred the plaintiffs' claim). Because we resolve the merits of the constitutional challenge in favor of the defendants, we need not reach the issues of res judicata or the City's standing.

We turn now to the merits of the constitutional challenge to the Welfare Reform Act's citizenship requirement.

A. Standard of Review

In order to assess the constitutionality of sec. 402 of the Welfare Reform Act, we must first determine the appropriate level of scrutiny for judicial review of the legislative enactment at issue. In Graham v. Richardson, 403 U.S. 365 (1971), the Supreme Court held that a state statute that denies welfare benefits to resident aliens (or denies benefits to resident aliens who have not resided in the United States for a specified number of years) violates equal protection. See id. at 376. Noting that aliens are a "'discrete and insular' minority," id. at 372 (quoting United States v. Carolene Prods. Co., 304 U.S. 144, 152-53 n.4 (1938)), the Court applied "heightened" or "close judicial scrutiny" to the statutes at issue. Id. The Court, however, limited its holding to state legislation. In...