Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-13-05163/USCOURTS-caDC-13-05163-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Gaylyn Dieringer
Appellant
Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation
Appellee
John Vanderkam
Appellant
Melissa Vanderkam
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 17, 2014 Decided January 20, 2015

No. 13-5163

JOHN VANDERKAM AND GAYLYN DIERINGER,

APPELLANTS

v.

MELISSA VANDERKAM,

APPELLEE

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:09-cv-01907)

Joseph R. Jeffery argued the cause and filed the briefs for 

appellants. 

Charles F. Fuller argued the cause and filed the briefs for 

appellee.

Before: TATEL and MILLETT, Circuit Judges, and 

GINSBURG, Senior Circuit Judge.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge TATEL. 

Concurring opinion filed by Senior Circuit Judge

GINSBURG.

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TATEL, Circuit Judge: The Employee Retirement Income 

Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) entitles certain spouses of 

pension plan participants to a survivor annuity unless waived 

pursuant to clearly defined procedures. In this case, the pension 

plan participant concedes that ERISA vested an annuity in his 

ex-wife, but nonetheless argues that Texas law, including his 

Texas divorce decree, requires entry now of a declaratory 

judgment that, after his death, she place her annuity payments 

into a constructive trust for his benefit. The district court 

rejected this claim, holding that ERISA preempts any state law 

or state-court decree that would otherwise defeat the spouse’s 

vested annuity. For the reasons set forth in this opinion, we 

affirm.

I. 

ERISA protects retirement benefits for millions of pension 

plan participants and their beneficiaries. 29 U.S.C. § 1001(b). 

Finding that the stability of retirement benefits directly affects 

the national economy, id. § 1001(a), Congress acted to ensure 

that accrued benefits remain unaltered by individuals and states 

alike. It accomplished this by prohibiting participants from 

assigning or alienating their own benefits, id. § 1056(d)(1), 

and, with limited exceptions, superseding state laws that 

“relate to any employee benefit plan,” id. § 1144(a). One 

exception rests on the fact that plan benefits are often 

considered marital community property, a domain traditionally 

reserved exclusively for state law. As a result, Congress 

exempted a narrow category of state-court orders, known as 

qualified domestic relations orders, from ERISA’s 

anti-alienation and preemption provisions. Id. 

§ 1056(d)(3)(A); § 1144(b)(7). A qualified domestic relations 

order is a state-court decree regarding marital property that 

creates or recognizes an alternate payee’s right to 

ERISA-governed benefits—for instance, changing the plan 

beneficiary from a soon-to-be ex-spouse to a child. Id. 

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§ 1056(d)(3)(B)(i). In order to qualify for the exemption, the 

state-court order may neither change the type or form of 

benefits nor increase the actuarial value of the plan. Id. 

§ 1056(d)(3)(D).

Despite this narrow exception, the protection of 

beneficiaries—especially spouses—remains a paramount 

ERISA objective. The crown jewel of ERISA’s spousal 

protection, the qualified joint and survivor annuity, provides 

monthly support for surviving spouses in the event of a 

participant’s death, whether occurring before or after 

retirement. Id. § 1055(a). Survivor annuity payments, equal to 

at least 50 percent of the participant’s benefits, continue for the 

remainder of the surviving spouse’s life. Id. § 1055(d)(1)(A). 

Although for most ERISA benefits, like life insurance and

401(k) plans, participants may unilaterally waive benefits or 

designate beneficiaries, participants are powerless to “defeat 

a . . . surviving spouse’s statutory entitlement to an annuity.” 

Boggs v. Boggs, 520 U.S. 833, 843 (1997). Without the 

spouse’s written consent expressly acknowledging the effect of 

the waiver or new beneficiary designation, a participant can 

neither waive nor alter the survivor annuity in any way. 29 

U.S.C. § 1055(c)(2). Under the version of the statute governing 

this case, moreover, the written consent must not only be 

witnessed by a plan representative or notary public, but also 

completed no more than 90 days before the annuity start date, 

i.e., the date the participant either dies or retires. Retirement 

Equity Act of 1984, Pub. L. No. 98–397, 98 Stat. 1426 (1984) 

(codified as amended at 29 U.S.C. §§ 1055(c)(2), (c)(7) 

(1984)). If a participant fails to obtain this written and 

witnessed waiver within the 90-day time limit, the survivor 

annuity vests in the spouse upon the participant’s retirement or 

death. Taken together, “[t]he surviving spouse annuity and 

[qualified domestic relations order] provisions, which 

acknowledge and protect specific pension plan community 

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property interests, give rise to the strong implication that other 

community property claims are not consistent with the 

statutory scheme.” Boggs, 520 U.S. at 847. 

This case presents a conflict between state community 

property law and ERISA. Specifically, we must determine 

whether, after a survivor annuity has vested and absent a 

qualified domestic relations order, the plan participant may use 

state law to obtain legal control over his former spouse’s 

survivor benefit. 

John and Melissa VanderKam married in 1984. An 

employee of the Huffy Corporation, John enrolled in the 

company’s retirement plan and designated Melissa as the 

beneficiary of a 100-percent qualified joint and survivor 

annuity. John retired in 1994, at which time the survivor 

annuity irrevocably vested in Melissa, and John began 

receiving monthly benefits. Eight years later, in March 2002, 

John and Melissa divorced, agreeing to a decree awarding John

all “benefits existing by reason of [John’s] past, present, or 

future employment.” Final Divorce Decree 19, J.A. 290. 

One year later, John remarried and sought to designate his 

new wife as the survivor annuity beneficiary. Counsel for 

Huffy’s pension plan advised John that this designation would 

be permissible if done pursuant to a qualified domestic 

relations order that, in accordance with ERISA, did not require 

the plan to increase benefits beyond actuarial estimates of 

John’s and Melissa’s life expectancies. See 29 U.S.C. 

§ 1056(d)(3)(D). In order to meet this requirement, John 

motioned the Texas court to modify the divorce decree by 

including an order naming his new wife as the annuity 

beneficiary and calculating annuity benefits based upon 

Melissa’s life expectancy. Melissa opposed John’s motion, 

arguing that she had consented to the divorce decree only 

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because she believed that the survivor annuity belonged to her 

and was therefore entirely separate from John’s retirement 

benefits. Her agreement to the decree, Melissa explained, 

resulted from a “trade-off between the parties” whereby “if 

[Melissa] kept the survivor benefit, . . . she would not touch the 

rest of [John’s] retirement, which is quite a large sum.” Hr’g on 

Mot. to Modify Tr. 7, J.A. 208. Also, pointing out that she was 

not a beneficiary of John’s life insurance policy, Melissa 

emphasized that the survivor annuity would represent her 

primary means of providing for the couple’s son in the event of 

John’s death. Rejecting Melissa’s arguments, the Texas court 

entered a purported qualified domestic relations order 

divesting Melissa of all ownership interests in John’s 

retirement benefits, including the survivor annuity.

In 2005, Huffy terminated its pension plan, and because 

the plan had insufficient assets to provide the benefits 

promised to its employees, the Pension Benefit Guaranty 

Corporation (PBGC) became the plan’s statutory trustee. 

Established by ERISA to provide pension benefit insurance 

and to “ensure that employees and their beneficiaries would 

not be deprived of anticipated retirement benefits by the 

termination of pension plans,” Connolly v. Pension Benefit 

Guaranty Corp., 475 U.S. 211, 214 (1986) (citation omitted), 

PBGC independently determines the benefits it will pay under 

ERISA and the terms of the terminated plan. After reviewing 

John’s file, PBGC determined that the supposed qualified 

domestic relations order was invalid and that Melissa remained 

the proper beneficiary of the survivor annuity. This ruling 

rested on two basic propositions. First, the Texas court order 

was not a valid qualified domestic relations order because it 

would require the plan to “provide a form of benefit, or [an] 

option, not otherwise provided under the plan.” Letter from 

Deborah Martin, PBGC Coordinator, to John VanderKam

(Dec. 18, 2009) (“PGBC Letter”) at 3, J.A. 257. Should John’s 

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new wife survive him, PBGC explained, she would receive 

survivor benefits for the remainder of her life, rather than the 

remainder of Melissa’s life, which “would create a bizarre, 

hybrid form of benefit” unavailable under the plan. PBGC 

Letter 5, J.A. 259. Second, relying on ERISA’s text and 

relevant federal court decisions, PBGC determined that unless 

waived in accordance with the procedure set forth in the statute 

and within the 90-day period, a spouse’s right to the survivor 

annuity irrevocably vests on the annuity start date—here, the 

day John retired. Accordingly, “the order could not transfer 

Melissa’s right to the survivor benefit to [the new wife].” 

PBGC Letter 6, J.A. 260. 

After PBGC’s Appeals Board affirmed the agency’s initial 

determination, John filed suit in the United States District 

Court for the District of Columbia, challenging PBGC’s 

decision as both contrary to ERISA and arbitrary and 

capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act. 

Second Am. Compl. 2–11; Pls.’ Mot. Summ. J. 12. In 

response, and citing Melissa’s affidavit swearing that she 

“never intended to waive the survivor benefit” and “wish[ed] 

to claim [her] right to that benefit,” PBGC asked the district 

court to join Melissa as a necessary party. Melissa VanderKam 

Aff., J.A. 12. After the district court granted that motion, John 

amended his complaint to allege unjust enrichment and breach 

of contract claims against Melissa, and, invoking a Texas

statute, sought a declaration that given the divorce decree, John 

“has equitable title to the . . . survivor benefit payments” and 

that “upon actual receipt of the survivor benefit payments, 

[Melissa] will owe fiduciary obligations to John and hold those 

payments in constructive trust.” Second Am. Compl. 13. The 

parties filed cross motions for summary judgment. 

Relying on cases from the Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth 

Circuits, the district court found PBGC’s two 

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determinations—that Melissa’s claim to the survivor benefit 

irrevocably vested upon John’s retirement and that the Texas 

court order was not a valid qualified domestic relations 

order—both reasonable and amply supported by the 

administrative record. VanderKam v. Pension Benefit 

Guaranty Corp., 943 F. Supp. 2d 130, 141–46 (D.D.C. 2013). 

As to the state-law claims against Melissa, the district court 

found them preempted by ERISA, emphasizing that the claims 

“are nothing more than an effort to make an end-run around 

ERISA’s statutory prescriptions” and would permit John “to 

achieve what [he] otherwise cannot accomplish under the 

statute itself—to divest Melissa of the survivor annuity benefit 

paid to her by PBGC.” Id. at 150. The district court therefore 

granted summary judgment in favor of PBGC and Melissa. 

After John filed his appeal here, we granted his motion to 

dismiss PBGC from the case, leaving only his appeal of the 

district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of Melissa 

on the state-law claims. Appellant’s Mot. to Dismiss PBGC 

(Apr. 2, 2014). Before reaching those claims, however, we 

must address the threshold issue of whether this case is ripe for 

review. See Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Federal Energy Regulatory 

Commission, 501 F.3d 204, 207 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (“The 

question of ripeness goes to our subject matter jurisdiction, and 

thus we can raise the issue sua sponte at any time.”) (internal 

quotation marks omitted). 

II.

Article III of the Constitution limits federal court 

jurisdiction to cases and controversies. U.S. Const. art. III, § 2. 

Consistent with this limitation and “our theoretical role as the 

governmental branch of last resort,” the ripeness doctrine 

precludes premature adjudication of “abstract disagreements” 

and instead reserves judicial power for resolution of concrete 

and “fully crystalized” disputes. National Treasury Employees 

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Union v. United States, 101 F.3d 1423, 1431 (D.C. Cir. 1996). 

Put simply, “Article III courts should not make decisions 

unless they have to.” Id. 

In this case, Melissa will receive no survivor benefits if 

she predeceases John, which suggests that “[i]f we do not 

decide [the case] now, we may never need to,” id. Given our 

“independent obligation to assure ourselves of jurisdiction,” 

Floyd v. District of Columbia, 129 F.3d 152, 155 (D.C. Cir. 

1997), we ordered supplemental briefing regarding whether 

this case is ripe for judicial review. 

To determine whether a dispute is ripe for judicial 

consideration, we must evaluate (1) “the fitness of the issues 

for judicial decision” and (2) “the hardship to the parties of 

withholding court consideration.” Abbott Laboratories v. 

Gardner, 387 U.S. 136, 149 (1967). 

Under the fitness element, “we look to see whether the 

issue is purely legal” or instead “would benefit from a more 

concrete setting.” National Association of Home Builders v. 

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 440 F.3d 459, 463–64 (D.C. 

Cir. 2006). The facts of the present case are undisputed, as is 

PBGC’s determination that ERISA vested the survivor annuity 

in Melissa. The single question presented—whether ERISA 

preempts John’s attempt to gain equitable title to Melissa’s 

survivor annuity—is thus purely legal. The fitness element also 

requires that we consider whether “deciding the issue now 

would violate principles of judicial restraint and efficiency that 

counsel against spending [our] scarce resources on what 

amounts to shadow boxing.” Alcoa Power Generating, Inc. v. 

FERC, 643 F.3d 963, 967 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (citations and 

internal quotation marks omitted). Addressing this purely legal 

question now raises no concern about inefficiency or waste of 

judicial resources.

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As to the second element, we agree with John that denial 

of judicial review would presently cause him significant 

hardship, as it would “interfere[] with John’s ability to make 

decisions about the organization of his estate and the 

distribution of his property after his death.” Appellant’s 

Supplemental Br. 2. The very purpose of ERISA benefits, 

especially benefits accruing to dependents and spouses, is to 

provide economic security and peace of mind. 29 U.S.C. 

§ 1001(a) (noting ERISA’s objective to protect “the continued 

well-being and security of millions of employees and their 

dependents”). Indeed, ERISA expressly authorizes preemptive 

litigation to “clarify . . . rights to future benefits under the 

terms of [a] plan.” Id. § 1132(a)(1)(B) (emphasis added). 

True, Melissa may predecease John, but John seeks 

declaratory relief now—relief that would be independent of 

any future events. John seeks not a constructive trust that will 

spring into existence only if Melissa someday receives the 

annuity payments, but rather a current declaration that he “has

equitable title to the . . . survivor benefit payments” and that 

“upon actual receipt of the . . . payments, [Melissa] will owe 

fiduciary obligations to John and hold those payments in 

constructive trust.” Second Am. Compl. 13 (emphases added). 

A final decision regarding John’s entitlement to such a 

declaration would give him an immediate, concrete, and 

valuable benefit: certainty regarding whether monthly annuity 

payments will be paid to his ex-spouse and son’s mother, or 

whether he can assign those payments to a different beneficiary 

of his choosing. This case thus presents a fully crystalized 

dispute ripe for our resolution. 

III.

Having elected to dismiss his appeal against PBGC, John 

makes three key concessions: (1) that the survivor annuity 

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vested in Melissa upon his retirement, (2) that any supposed 

waiver in the divorce agreement was invalid under ERISA, and 

(3) that the Texas court order was not a valid qualified 

domestic relations order. In other words, John concedes that 

under ERISA, the survivor annuity belongs to Melissa. Given 

this, we face a single question: May John use state law to seize

a benefit that federal law has vested in Melissa?

ERISA “supersede[s] any and all State laws insofar as they 

may now or hereafter relate to any employee benefit plan.” 29 

U.S.C. § 1144(a). Despite the simplicity of the statutory text, 

“ERISA pre-emption questions are recurrent,” reflecting “the 

comprehensive nature of the statute, the centrality of pension 

and welfare plans in the national economy, and their 

importance to the financial security of the Nation’s work 

force.” Boggs, 520 U.S. at 839. But in Boggs v. Boggs, a 

decision central to our resolution of this case, the Supreme 

Court helpfully narrowed the ERISA preemption inquiry. 

Under Boggs, rather than examine conflicts between state law 

and ERISA’s text, we may “simply ask[] if state law conflicts 

with the provisions of ERISA or operates to frustrate its 

objects.” Id. at 841. And as instructed by the Court in Hillman 

v. Maretta, in order to answer that question, “we must first 

ascertain the nature of the federal interest.” 133 S. Ct. 1943, 

1950 (2013). 

In this case, the nature of the federal interest is obvious. 

Congress designed ERISA “to promote the interests of 

employees and their beneficiaries in employee benefit plans.” 

Shaw v. Delta Air Lines, Inc., 463 U.S. 85, 90 (1983). With 

respect to qualified joint and survivor annuities specifically, 

Congress displayed special “solicitude for the economic 

security of surviving spouses” and legislated to “provide 

detailed protections to spouses of plan participants which, in 

some cases, exceed what their rights would be were [state] 

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community property law the sole measure.” Boggs, 520 U.S. at 

843, 841. Prior to ERISA, no law required that pension plans 

support spouses beyond the life of the participant. H.R. Rep. 

No. 93–807, at 4732 (1974). Recognizing that this void could 

“result in a hardship where an individual primarily dependent 

on his pension as a source of retirement income is unable to 

make adequate provision for his spouse’s retirement years 

should he predecease her,” Congress required that “if a plan 

provides for a lifetime annuity” for participants, “the plan must 

[also] provide for a joint and survivor annuity.” Id. Congress 

strengthened these provisions in 1984 by enacting the 

Retirement Equity Act (REA), which enlarged ERISA’s 

protection for surviving spouses in three significant respects. 

First, although the joint and survivor annuity was initially a 

mere “option entirely within a participant’s discretion,” Boggs, 

520 U.S. at 843 (citing 29 U.S.C. §§ 1055(a), (e) (1982)), the 

REA removed that discretion by prohibiting a participant from 

waiving the survivor annuity without spousal consent, Boggs, 

520 U.S. at 843 (citing 29 U.S.C. § 1055(c)). Second, as 

evidence of Congress’s concern not only for surviving spouses, 

but also for “spouse[s] and dependent children in the event of 

divorce or separation,” Boggs, 520 U.S. at 847, the REA made 

annuities payable to surviving spouses so long as the spouse 

was married to the participant at the time of 

retirement—regardless of marital status at the time of the 

participant’s death, Hopkins v. AT & T Global Information 

Solutions Co., 105 F.3d 153, 156 (4th Cir. 1997) (citing 29 

U.S.C. §§ 1055(a), (f)). Third, although ERISA initially had 

nothing to say about whether and how beneficiaries could 

waive survivor benefits, the REA established a clear and 

defined procedure for waiving a survivor annuity, requiring an 

express, witnessed waiver within 90 days of the annuity start 

date. 29 U.S.C. §§ 1055(c)(2), (c)(7)(A). Through these three 

amendments, Congress recognized “the status of marriage as 

an economic partnership” and sought to protect “the substantial 

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contribution to that partnership of spouses who work both in 

and outside the home.” Retirement Equity Act of 1984, Pub. L. 

No. 98–397, 98 Stat. 1426 (1984). 

Against this clear congressional objective—ensuring

ongoing financial support for divorced and surviving 

spouses—John invokes a Texas statute providing that “[t]he 

subsequent actual receipt by the non-owning party of property 

awarded to the owner in a decree of divorce or annulment 

creates a fiduciary obligation in favor of the owner and 

imposes a constructive trust on the property for the benefit of 

the owner.” Tex. Fam. Code Ann. § 9.011(b). Despite 

conceding that ERISA vested the survivor benefit in Melissa, 

John argues that the divorce decree and this Texas statute

entitle him to a declaration that he “has equitable title” to 

Melissa’s survivor benefit, and that upon receipt of her 

annuity, Melissa is bound by Texas law to deliver it to John’s 

designee. Second Am. Compl. 13. 

The conflict between ERISA and Texas law could hardly 

be starker—what ERISA gives to Melissa, John argues, Texas 

takes away. But as the Supreme Court held in Boggs, “in the 

face of this direct clash between state law and the provisions 

and objectives of ERISA, the state law cannot stand.” Boggs, 

520 U.S. at 844. Any other result would frustrate Congress’s 

objective to provide “enhanced protection to the spouse and 

dependent children in the event of divorce” by “ensur[ing] a 

stream of income to surviving spouses.” Id. at 847, 843 

(emphases added). Simply put, John may not use Texas law to 

compel an outcome expressly barred by ERISA. 

John nonetheless insists that his claims fall outside 

ERISA’s preemption of state laws that “relate to any employee 

benefit plan,” 29 U.S.C. § 1144(a) (emphasis added), because 

he seeks title only to Melissa’s benefits. In Boggs, however, the 

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Supreme Court expressly rejected this argument. There, a 

participant’s first wife attempted to transfer her survivor 

annuity benefits to the couple’s adult sons through her will. 

Boggs, 520 U.S. at 833. After her death, the participant married 

his second wife, in whom the survivor annuity vested after the 

participant’s death and against whom the sons attempted to 

enforce the testamentary transfer. Id. Holding the state law 

permitting the transfer preempted, the Court rejected the 

argument that the claims “affect[ed] only what a plan 

participant may do with his or her benefits after they are 

received and not the relationship between the pension plan 

administrator and the plan beneficiary.” Id. at 838. Accepting 

that argument, the Court declared, “would undermine the 

purpose of ERISA’s mandated survivor’s annuity.” Id. at 844. 

So too here.

John also contends that although the divorce agreement is 

invalid as a waiver of Melissa’s right to receive her survivor 

annuity under ERISA, the agreement remains a valid waiver of 

Melissa’s right to retain her benefits under Texas law. In fact, 

he argues, Melissa is collaterally estopped from arguing 

otherwise. But this argument only highlights the conflict 

between ERISA and the Texas statute: state law may not 

resurrect an agreement invalidated by federal law. And, like 

John’s plan vs. benefits argument, the distinction between the 

right to receive benefits, as opposed to the right to retain them, 

has been expressly rejected by the Supreme Court. In Hillman, 

the Court invalidated a state law that imposed personal liability 

on beneficiaries of life insurance under the Federal Employee 

Group Life Insurance Act, holding that with a beneficiary’s 

designation “comes the expectation that the . . . proceeds will 

be paid . . . and that the beneficiary can use them.” 133 S. Ct. 

at 1953 (emphasis added). Indeed, “the term ‘beneficiary’ 

itself . . . would be meaningless if the only effect of a 

designation were to saddle the nominal beneficiary with 

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liability under state law for the full value of the proceeds.” Id. 

at 1956 (Thomas, J., concurring). For this reason, the Court 

held, “where a beneficiary has been duly named, 

the . . . proceeds she is owed under [federal law] cannot be 

allocated to another person by operation of state law.” Id. at 

1953. That reasoning applies with equal force to ERISA 

beneficiaries. 

Finally, John points to the Supreme Court’s decision in 

Kennedy v. Plan Administrator for DuPont Savings & 

Investment Plan, which expressly left open the question 

whether, after benefits are distributed, state courts can enforce 

a beneficiary’s waiver of her interest in pension plan benefits. 

555 U.S. 285, 299 n.10 (2009). Some courts, most recently the 

Fourth Circuit in Andochick v. Byrd, have held that such suits 

are not preempted by ERISA because there is “no conflict with 

either ERISA’s objectives or relevant Supreme Court 

precedent.” 709 F.3d 296, 298 (4th Cir. 2013). Unlike 

Andochick, however, this is not a post-distribution case. 

Rather, as explained above in our ripeness discussion, John 

seeks a pre-distribution declaration that he currently “has 

equitable title to the . . . survivor benefit payments.” Second 

Am. Compl. 13. Moreover, none of the cases John cites, 

including Kennedy, involves survivor annuity benefits. 

Instead, they concern other ERISA benefits, such as life 

insurance and 401(k) plans, that are not subject to the rigorous 

waiver provisions that govern survivor annuities. With respect 

to survivor annuities, absent an express and witnessed waiver, 

“Congress has spoken with force and clarity in directing that 

the proceeds belong to the named beneficiary and no other.” 

Hillman, 133 S. Ct. at 1951 (citation omitted). 

Indeed, the Ninth Circuit, the only circuit to have 

considered the Kennedy question in the survivor annuity 

context, concluded that permitting a “constructive trust on the 

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proceeds of a pension plan . . . would allow for an end-run 

around ERISA’s rules and Congress’s policy objective of 

providing for certain beneficiaries, thereby greatly weakening, 

if not entirely abrogating, ERISA’s broad preemption 

provision.” Carmona v. Carmona, 603 F.3d 1041, 1061 (9th 

Cir. 2008). We agree. The survivor annuity waiver provisions 

are aimed at preventing precisely this type of situation, where a 

participant seeks to enforce an invalid waiver of his spouse’s 

primary means of supporting herself following a divorce. 

In conclusion, we emphasize the narrowness of our 

opinion. This case involves an effort by a plan participant to 

obtain an interest in undistributed plan benefits, and we hold 

only that absent a qualified domestic relations order and 

compliance with ERISA’s strict waiver provisions for survivor 

annuities, he may not use state law for that purpose. This 

opinion has nothing to say about how ERISA might affect an 

effort by a plan participant to use state law to obtain an interest 

in benefits after distribution to the beneficiary. That question is 

not presented in this case, and we express no opinion on it.

IV.

For the reasons given above, we affirm the judgment of the 

district court.

So ordered.

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GINSBURG, Senior Circuit Judge, concurring: 

Although I agree John VanderKam may not use state law 

to obtain an interest in Melissa VanderKam’s ERISAprotected survivor annuity, I write separately to emphasize 

that the Court has not today decided all state laws are 

preempted insofar as they burden qualified joint and survivor 

annuity (QJSA) benefits that have not yet been disbursed. 

The Court’s holding is necessarily limited to the situation in 

which the claimed source of authority for obtaining an interest

in QJSA benefits is an agreement in the divorce decree of a 

plan participant and his beneficiary in which the beneficiary 

purports to waive her right to the survivor annuity. Because 

other ways of obtaining an interest in ERISA benefits,

specifically those to which the Congress spoke in the antialienation provision of 29 U.S.C. § 1056(d), are not before us,

we have no occasion to decide whether the requirements for 

assignment and alienation in § 1056(d) preempt a state law 

that would transfer the annuity pursuant to an agreement to 

assign rather than to waive the benefits.

 

John argues that although the divorce decree did not give 

rise to a valid qualified domestic relations order (QDRO), the

requirements for a QDRO in § 1056(d) are intended only to 

“creat[e] a path for participants and beneficiaries to enforce 

their private agreements directly against a plan” and therefore 

do not preempt a state law that is used to enforce directly 

against a beneficiary her agreement to alienate her benefits. 

John’s argument is beside the point because Melissa “did not 

assign or alienate anything to [John] or to the Estate later 

standing in his shoes.” Kennedy v. Plan Adm’r for DuPont 

Sav. & Inv. Plan, 555 U.S. 285, 292-97 (2009) (holding a 

nearly identical provision of a divorce decree was an 

attempted waiver, not an assignment, and therefore should not 

be analyzed for validity under the requirements for a QDRO). 

It is therefore sufficient today for us to hold the QJSA 

provision in ERISA preempts a state law that would give 

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effect to an otherwise invalid waiver of QJSA benefits; we 

need not address whether the QDRO provision preempts a 

state law that provides a different way of obtaining an interest 

in QJSA benefits. An example might be a car dealer suing a 

QJSA beneficiary who gave the dealer a security interest in

her future stream of benefits in exchange for a car.

USCA Case #13-5163 Document #1532797 Filed: 01/20/2015 Page 17 of 17