Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-casd-3_07-cv-00667/USCOURTS-casd-3_07-cv-00667-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 863
Nature of Suit: Social Security - DIWC/DIWW (405(g))
Cause of Action: 42:405 Review of HHS Decision (SSID)

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

JUDITH S. WILLIAMS 

Wage Earner: JOHN W. MALONEY,

Plaintiff,

CASE NO. 07-CV-0667 H (NLS)

ORDER DENYING

PLAINTIFF’S MOTION FOR

SUMMARY JUDGMENT AND

GRANTING DEFENDANT’S

CROSS-MOTION FOR

SUMMARY JUDGMENT

vs.

MICHAEL J. ASTRUE, Commissioner of

Social Security,

Defendant.

On April 13, 2007, plaintiff Judith S. Williams (“Plaintiff”) filed a complaint pursuant

to section 205(g) of the Social Security Act (“Act”) requesting judicial review of the final

decision of the Commissioner of the Social Security Administration (“Commissioner” or

“Defendant”) denying Plaintiff’s claim for Social Security Widow’s Insurance Benefits under

Title II of the Act. (Doc. No. 1.) On August 31, 2007, Plaintiff filed a motion for summary

judgment. (Doc. No. 14.) On October 12, 2007, Defendant filed a cross-motion for summary

judgment and opposition to Plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment. (Doc. No. 16.) Plaintiff

filed a reply to Defendant’s opposition on October 31, 2007. (Doc. No. 17.) 

For the following reasons, the Court denies Plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment

and grants Defendant’s cross-motion for summary judgment, and affirms the decision of the

Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”). 

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Background

Plaintiff was married to the wage earner, John W. Maloney, on April 16, 2004. 

(Transcript of Record (“Tr.”) 33.) Mr. Maloney passed away on January 11, 2005. (Tr.

32.) On February 2, 2005, Plaintiff filed an application for widow’s benefits under Title II

of the Social Security Act. (Tr. 16-18.) Following a hearing at which Plaintiff appeared,

the ALJ denied Plaintiff’s claim on June 12, 2006. (Tr. 13-15.) The ALJ determined that

Plaintiff was not married to the decedent for more than nine months as required by the Act,

that none of the exceptions to the nine-month requirement applied, and that Plaintiff failed

to establish the existence of a common law marriage. (Tr. 13-15.) On April 10, 2006, the

Appeals Council denied review of the ALJ’s ruling, causing it to become the

Commissioner’s final decision. (Tr. 3-5.) Plaintiff commenced this action for judicial

review on April 13, 2007. 

Discussion

A. Review of Commissioner’s Decision - Legal Standard

Section 205(g) of the Act allows unsuccessful applicants to seek judicial review of a

final agency decision of the Commissioner. 42 U.S.C. § 405(g). The Commissioner’s

denial of benefits “will be disturbed only if it is not supported by substantial evidence or is

based on legal error.” Brawner v. Sec’y of Health and Human Serv., 839 F.2d 432, 433

(9th Cir. 1988) (citing Green v. Heckler, 803 F.2d 528, 529 (9th Cir. 1986)). Substantial

evidence means “more than a mere scintilla” but less than a preponderance, and is such

“relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion.” 

Sandgathe v. Chater, 108 F.3d 978, 980 (9th Cir. 1997) (quoting Andrews v. Shalala, 53

F.3d 1035, 1039 (9th Cir. 1995)). The court must consider the record as a whole, weighing

both the evidence that supports and detracts from the Commissioner’s conclusions. Id. If

the evidence supports more than one rational interpretation, the court must uphold the

ALJ’s decision. Allen v. Heckler, 749 F.2d 577, 579 (9th Cir. 1984). Even if the

reviewing court finds that substantial evidence supports the ALJ’s decision, however, the

court must set aside the decision if the ALJ failed to apply the proper legal standards in

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1 In various circumstances a claimant is entitled to waiver of the nine-month

requirement. It does not appear that Plaintiff argued for the application of any of these exceptions;

in any event the ALJ determined that none applied. (Tr. 15.) Additionally, the ALJ rejected

Plaintiff’s contention that a common law marriage existed prior to the date of the claimant’s official

marriage date of April 26, 2004, see Tr. 14, a contention Plaintiff does not renew here.

2 365 divided by 12 equals 30.41667. 

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weighing the evidence and reaching his or her decision. Benitez v. Califano, 573 F.2d 653,

655 (9th Cir. 1978).

B. Widow’s Insurance Benefits

To qualify as a “widow” for purposes of widow’s insurance benefits the surviving

spouse must have been married to the deceased spouse for a period “not less than nine

months immediately prior to the day on which he died.” 42 U.S.C. § 416(c)(1); 20 C.F.R. 

§ 404.335(a)(1).1

 For purposes of computing marital duration, the term “month” is defined

by the Commissioner, pursuant to the Program Operations Manual System (an internal

agency document) as follows: 

“For purposes of this duration provision, a month is a period ending with the

day of the succeeding month numerically corresponding to the day of its

beginning, less one. Count both the day of the marriage and the day

preceding the death in figuring the 9-month period.” 

As an example of this computation, the POMS states, “If a worker died on 11/15/89, the

marriage would have to have occurred no later than 2/15/89, in order for it to have existed 9

months on 11/14/89, the day immediately preceding the day on which the worker died.”

C. Whether the Commissioner Applied the Correct Legal Standard 

Plaintiff’s main contention is that she in fact was married to the wage earner for

more than 9 months. The premise of this argument is Plaintiff’s assertion that a month

equals 30 days, a number Plaintiff computed by dividing the number of days in a year (365)

by the number of months in a year (12) and, presumably, by rounding down to the nearest

whole number.2

 (See Tr. 30.) Therefore, Plaintiff argues, 9 months equals 270 days. Since

there are 271 days between April 16, 2004 (the date of Plaintiff’s marriage to the wage

earner) and January 11, 2005 (the date of the wage earner’s death), Plaintiff contends that

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she satisfied the 9-month requirement and that the ALJ’s determination to the contrary

should be reversed.

The Court concludes that the Commissioner applied the proper legal standard to

determine whether Plaintiff met the statutory nine-month requirement. The plain language

of the statute requires nine months, not nine consecutive 30-day periods. Additionally,

although the POMS utilized by the Commissioner may not be a regulation with the force of

law, the fact remains that it is a reasonable interpretation by the Commissioner of a statute

her agency is charged with implementing. Accordingly, it is entitled to deference by this

Court. Warre v. Commissioner, 439 F.3d 1001, 1005 (9th Cir. 2006); see Chevron U.S.A.,

Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837 (1984). The Court declines

to replace the agency’s valid and reasonable interpretation with the novel construction of

the nine-month requirement offered by Plaintiff. Furthermore, even Plaintiff’s own

suggested interpretation only supports her argument with the additional benefit of rounding

down to the nearest whole number. Nine multiplied by the true average number of days in

each month (30.41667) equals 273.75 days, more than two days longer than Plaintiff’s

marriage to the wage earner lasted.

D. Whether Substantial Evidence Supports the Commissioner’s Decision

Next, Plaintiff contends that the agency’s determination should be reversed because

the ALJ’s conclusion was not supported by substantial evidence. This argument by

Plaintiff seizes upon the following sentence in the ALJ’s written findings of fact: “The

claimant married the wage earner on April 26, 2004, which is more than nine months after

the wage earner died. (Tr. 15.) The sentence contains two apparent typographical errors. 

First, Plaintiff married the wage earner on April 16, not April 26. (See Tr. 33.) Second, it

is impossible for Plaintiff to have married the wage earner “after” the wage earner died. 

The Court affirms the ALJ’s decision, which is based not merely on “substantial”

evidence but on undisputed evidence. The parties do not dispute the relevant dates in this

matter (April 16, 2004, and January 11, 2005), conclusive evidence of which is supplied by

the marriage and death certificates contained in the record. (Tr. 32-33.) Plaintiff is correct

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that the Court may not accept post-hoc rationalizations to affirm an ALJ decision that

although correct in result is not based on substantial evidence or fails to set forth the

reasons for its conclusion. See Lewin v. Schweiker, 654 F.2d 631, 634-35 (9th Cir. 1981)

(ALJ’s decision should state the subordinate factual foundations on which the ALJ’s

ultimate factual conclusions are based, so that a reviewing court may know the basis for the

decision). That rule simply does not apply to Plaintiff’s case. The Court’s task is to

consider whether the evidence in the record supports the agency’s conclusion, see

Sandgathe v. Chater, 108 F.3d at 980, which it clearly does in this case, notwithstanding the

apparent typographical errors in the ALJ’s written decision. Cf. Tonapetyan v. Halter, 242

F.3d 1144, 1150 (9th Cir. 2001) (ALJ’s duty to further develop record only triggered when

evidence is ambiguous or where record is insufficient to allow proper evaluation of

evidence).

Conclusion

For the reasons discussed above, the Court denies Plaintiff’s motion for summary

judgment and grants Defendant’s cross-motion for summary judgment. 

IT IS SO ORDERED

DATED: November 19, 2007

MARILYN L. HUFF, District Judge

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

COPIES TO:

All parties of record.

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