De Castro v. Weinberger
| Decision Date | 30 September 1975 |
| Docket Number | No. 74 C 1830.,74 C 1830. |
| Parties | Helen de CASTRO, Plaintiff, v. Caspar WEINBERGER, the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois |
Sherwin & Sherwin, Chicago, Ill., for plaintiff.
Samuel K. Skinner, U. S. Atty., Chicago, Ill., for defendant.
Before TONE, Circuit Judge, and MAROVITZ and WILL, District Judges.
The plaintiff, Helen de Castro, brings this action under 42 U.S.C. § 405(g) seeking review of a final decision of the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare denying her application for benefits. Helen de Castro is currently 60 years of age. She and the wage earner, Albert de Castro, were married on September 9, 1946, and were divorced on February 8, 1968, after more than 21 years of marriage. The divorce decree provided for no alimony or support and plaintiff has received none from her former husband since the entry of the decree.
Two children, Rosemary de Castro and Catherine de Castro, were born of the marriage. Catherine, 24 years of age, is mentally retarded, has been mentally disabled since birth, and is acknowledged to be entitled to child's insurance benefits on an entitled wage earner's account. Plaintiff has continually cared for Catherine since December 5, 1966 when Albert de Castro left plaintiff and his family and returned to the Philippine Islands where he has since remained. For a time thereafter, plaintiff was able to work, securing assistance with Catherine from her mother. Since her mother's death she has had to forego work to care for Catherine. Albert de Castro became entitled to old age insurance benefits on September 2, 1971, effective March, 1971.
At the heart of plaintiff's complaint is a constitutional challenge directed against section 202 of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. § 402, which provides for benefits to the wife of a qualified wage earner who has a disabled child within her care. By reason of the defendant's interpretation of that section as excluding otherwise qualified but divorced wives who have not attained the age of 62 years, plaintiff claims that she has been arbitrarily discriminated against in violation of the principles of equal protection embodied in the Fifth Amendment. See Weinberger v. Wiesenfeld, 420 U.S. 636, 643, 95 S.Ct. 1225, 43 L. Ed.2d 514 (1975). Since plaintiff seeks both a declaration that section 402(b)(1) (B) is unconstitutional on its face and as applied to her, as well as injunctive relief enjoining the enforcement of the statute to deny her insurance benefits and ordering payments of benefits from the date of first entitlement, plaintiff has properly requested the convening of a three-judge court pursuant to 28 U.S. C. §§ 2281, 2282. Because there are no issues of material fact surrounding the constitutional dispute, the parties have submitted to the three-judge court cross motions for summary judgment, which, for the reasons set forth hereinafter, will be granted in plaintiff's favor.
Helen de Castro qualifies as a divorced wife under the Act which provides:
Plaintiff has not remarried. Furthermore, because she has not reached the age of 62 years, she is not entitled to benefits in her own right.
Assuming that she qualified under § 402(b)(1), plaintiff filed an application for benefits on the account of Albert de Castro as the divorced wife of a wage earner having in her care a child entitled to benefits. Section 402(b)(1) provides in part:
Her application was initially denied. After a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge, however, it was determined that she was entitled to a wife's benefits effective January 1, 1973. Thereafter, the Appeals Council of the Social Security Administration on its own motion decided to review the decision of the Administrative Law Judge, and, on May 3, 1974, reversed his decision, concluding that section 402(b)(1) (B) did not extend to divorced wives under age 62 who were caring for a dependent child but only to married wives. Accordingly, plaintiff was denied benefits. She now seeks review of the Appeal Council's ruling.
Plaintiff's challenge to the statutory classification, which deprives a divorced wife1 with dependent children of a wife's benefits, is framed in the alternative. She contends that freedom of personal choice in matters of marriage and family life, which includes the right to obtain a divorce, is a "fundamental" right protected under the Constitution, and that marital status should be considered as an inherently suspect classification. She argues that the Court should employ the more rigorous strict scrutiny test in determining whether the distinction found in 402(b)(1)(B) is constitutionally sound. In the event this standard for review is not found to be controlling, she argues that even under the more traditional "rational basis test" the classification must fail.
Plaintiff's attempt to invoke the more exacting strict scrutiny test as the appropriate standard for review here is without merit. Relying on the Supreme Court's recognition of the right to marry as "one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness"2 and the Court's characterization as fundamental of certain natural incidents of marriage, the plaintiff argues that freedom to dissolve the bonds of matrimony should also be recognized as a fundamental personal right and accorded the same constitutional protection extended the right to marry.
While it is undeniable that divorce is becoming more commonplace, we do not agree with plaintiff that it is a right recognized by the Constitution as fundamental to the pursuit of happiness. On the contrary, as expressed by the court in Sosna v. State of Iowa, 360 F.Supp. 1182 (N.D.Iowa, 1973), affirmed by the United States Supreme Court, 419 U.S. 393, 95 S.Ct. 553, 42 L.Ed.2d 532 (1975):
Unlike voting or welfare, the concept of divorce is not a constitutional right nor is it a basic necessity to survival. Sosna, supra, at 1184.
Nor do we find plaintiff's suggestion that marital status should be aligned with race, national origin and alienage as a "suspect" classification to be persuasive.3 Marital status is not an immutable characteristic determined solely by the accident of birth nor are statutory distinctions based upon it inherently odious or invidious. Absent these necessary criteria, marital status is clearly distinguishable from recognized suspect classifications, and does not warrant close judicial scrutiny.4
At issue here is legislation in the area of social welfare. Recognizing the wide latitude afforded Congress in making statutory classifications affecting public health, safety and welfare, the courts have customarily applied the traditional rational basis test as the appropriate standard for review. So long as the statutory classification bears some rational relationship to a legitimate legislative purpose and is free from invidious discrimination, it has withstood equal protection and Fifth Amendment challenges. Flemming v. Nestor, 363 U.S. 603, 80 S.Ct. 1367, 4 L.Ed.2d 1425 (1960); Richardson v. Belcher, 404 U.S. 78, 92 S.Ct. 254, 30 L.Ed.2d 231 (1971); Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U.S. 749, 95 S.Ct. 2457, 45 L.Ed.2d 522 (1975). The primary issue before the court then is whether the exclusion of divorced wives from § 402 benefits has a rational relationship to some legitimate governmental purpose and is not an invidious discrimination.
The defendant has attempted to justify § 402(b)(1)(B)'s limited coverage on the following five grounds:
1. Section 402(b) was originally intended to afford more adequate protection to the family as a unit, and since divorce terminates the legal relationship between the wage earner and his former spouse, the exclusion of divorced wives from these benefits is clearly explainable.
2. Allowing these benefits to divorced wives would potentially entitle them to greater benefits than married wives, since the domestic relations courts generally provide for support payments.
3. Social Security constitutes remedial welfare legislation and Congress need not attack every aspect of a problem. Here it chose to attack the more urgent need of married wives with dependent children.
4. The budgetary consequences of allowing payment to plaintiff and other qualified divorced wives could seriously affect the actuarial integrity of the Social Security trust fund.
5. The controversy is non-justiciable because the remedy sought by the plaintiff, which would expand the benefit class, encroaches upon grounds constitutionally reserved to Congress.
The defendant's argument characterizing the preservation and integrity of the family unit as an acceptable rationale for excluding divorced wives fails to recognize the significant changes in the nature and extent of the Act's coverage and its present posture. When originally enacted in 1935, the Social Security Act provided benefits only to the covered wage earner. It is true that, in 1939, when benefits were first extended to other members of the wage earner's immediate...
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Mathews v. Castro
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