Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/397/471/
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 12:13:59+00:00

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1. The Maryland regulation is not prohibited by the Social Security Act. Pp. 397 U. S. 476-483.
(a) A State has great latitude in dispensing its available funds, King v. Smith, 392 U. S. 309, 392 U. S. 318-319, and, given Maryland's finite resources available for public welfare demands, it is not prevented by the Act from sustaining as many families as it can and providing the largest families with somewhat less than their ascertained per capita standard of need. Pp. 397 U. S. 478-480.
(b) The statutory standard in § 402(a)(10) of the Act that aid "shall be furnished with reasonable promptness to all eligible indiiduals," is not violated by the regulation, which does not deprive children of the largest families of aid, but reduces the family grant as a whole, and the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare has approved the Maryland scheme. Pp. 397 U. S. 480-482.
(c) In its Social Security Amendments of 1967, Congress fully recognized that maximum grant regulations are permissible. Pp. 397 U. S. 482-483.
2. The regulation does not violate the Equal Protection Clause. Pp. 397 U. S. 483-487.
(a) The concept of overbreadth, though relevant where First Amendment considerations are involved, is not pertinent to state regulation in the social and economic field. Pp. 397 U. S. 484-485.
(b) The regulation is rationally supportable and free from invidious discrimination, since it furthers the State's legitimate interest in encouraging employment and in maintaining an equitable balance between welfare families and the families of the working poor. Pp. 397 U. S. 486-487.
With Dependent Children (AFDC) program, 42 U.S.C. § 601 et seq. (1964 ed. and Supp. IV), which originated with the Social Security Act of 1935. [Footnote 1] Under this jointly financed program, a State computes the so-called "standard of need" of each eligible family unit within its borders. See generally Rosado v. Wyman, ante, p. 397 U. S. 397. Some States provide that every family shall receive grants sufficient to meet fully the determined standard of need. Other States provide that each family unit shall receive a percentage of the determined need. Still others provide grants to most families in full accord with the ascertained standard of need, but impose an upper limit on the total amount of money any one family unit may receive. Maryland, through administrative adoption of a "maximum grant regulation," has followed this last course. This suit was brought by several AFDC recipients to enjoin the application of the Maryland maximum grant regulation on the ground that it is in conflict with the Social Security Act of 1935 and with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. A three-judge District Court, convened pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2281, held that the Maryland regulation violates the Equal Protection Clause. 297 F.Supp. 450. This direct appeal followed, 28 U.S.C. § 1253, and we noted probable jurisdiction, 396 U.S. 811.
have large families, so that their standards of need, as computed by the State, substantially exceed the maximum grants that they actually receive under the regulation. The appellees urged in the District Court that the maximum grant limitation operates to discriminate against them merely because of the size of their families, in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. They claimed further that the regulation is incompatible with the purpose of the Social Security Act of 1935, as well as in conflict with its explicit provisions.
if the appellees' position on this question is correct, there is no occasion to reach the constitutional issues. Ashwander v. TVA, 297 U. S. 288, 297 U. S. 346-347 (Brandeis, J., concurring); Rosenberg v. Fleuti, 374 U. S. 449.
"provide . . . that all individuals wishing to make application for aid to families with dependent children shall have opportunity to do so, and that aid to families with dependent children shall be furnished with reasonable promptness to all eligible individuals."
The argument is that the state regulation denies benefits to the younger children in a large family. Thus, the appellees say, the regulation is in patent violation of the Act, since those younger children are just as "dependent"
as their older siblings under the definition of "dependent child" fixed by federal law. [Footnote 8] See King v. Smith, 392 U. S. 309. Moreover, it is argued that the regulation, in limiting the amount of money any single household may receive, contravenes a basic purpose of the federal law by encouraging the parents of large families to "farm out" their children to relatives whose grants are not yet subject to the maximum limitation.
that is affected. Whether this per capita diminution is compatible with the statute is the question here. For the reasons that follow, we have concluded that the Maryland regulation is permissible under the federal law.
"[t]here is no question that States have considerable latitude in allocating their AFDC resources, since each State is free to set its own standard of need and to determine the level of benefits by the amount of funds it devotes to the program."
Id. at 392 U. S. 318-319.
"For the purpose of encouraging the care of dependent children in their own homes or in the homes of relatives by enabling each State to furnish financial assistance and rehabilitation and other services, as far as practicable under the conditions in such State, to needy dependent children and the parents or relatives with whom they are living to help maintain and strengthen family life and to help such parents or relatives to attain or retain capability for the maximum self-support and personal independence consistent with the maintenance of continuing parental care and protection. . . ."
(Emphasis added.) Thus, the starting point of the statutory analysis must be a recognition that the federal law gives each State great latitude in dispensing its available funds.
"is . . . computed by treating the relative, parent or spouse of parent, as the case may be, of the 'dependent child' as a part of the family unit."
economics of scale -- to accommodate their needs to diminished per capita payments. The strong policy of the statute in favor of preserving family units does not prevent a State from sustaining as many families as it can, and providing the largest families somewhat less than their ascertained per capita standard of need. [Footnote 10] Nor does the maximum grant system necessitate the dissolution of family bonds. For even if a parent should be inclined to increase his per capita family income by sending a child away, the federal law requires that the child, to be eligible for AFDC payments, must live with one of several enumerated relatives. [Footnote 11] The kinship tie may be attenuated, but it cannot be destroyed.
noted, the practical effect of the Maryland regulation is that all children, even in very large families, do receive some aid. We find nothing in 42 U.S.C. § 602(a)(10) (1964 ed., Supp. IV) that requires more than this. [Footnote 12] So long as some aid is provided to all eligible families and all eligible children, the statute itself is not violated.
"[The State shall] provide that, by July 1, 1969, the amounts used by the State to determine the needs of individuals will have been adjusted to reflect fully changes in living costs since such amounts were established, and any maximum that the State imposes on the amount of aid paid to families will have been proportionately adjusted."
"[b]ecause it cuts too broad a swath on an indiscriminate basis as applied to the entire group of AFDC eligibles to which it purports to apply. . . ."
era long ago passed into history. Ferguson v. Skrupa, 372 U. S. 726.
In the area of economics and social welfare, a State does not violate the Equal Protection Clause merely because the classifications made by its laws are imperfect. If the classification has some "reasonable basis," it does not offend the Constitution simply because the classification "is not made with mathematical nicety or because in practice it results in some inequality." Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61, 220 U. S. 78.
"The problems of government are practical ones, and may justify, if they do not require, rough accommodations -- illogical, it may be, and unscientific."
Metropolis Theatre Co. v. City of Chicago, 228 U. S. 61, 228 U. S. 69-70. "A statutory discrimination will not be set aside if any state of facts reasonably may be conceived to justify it." McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420, 366 U. S. 426.
choose between attacking every aspect of a problem or not attacking the problem at all. Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61. It is enough that the State's action be rationally based and free from invidious discrimination. The regulation before us meets that test.
We do not decide today that the Maryland regulation is wise, that it best fulfills the relevant social and economic objectives that Maryland might ideally espouse, or that a more just and humane system could not be devised. Conflicting claims of morality and intelligence are raised by opponents and proponents of almost every measure, certainly including the one before us. But the intractable economic, social, and even philosophical problems presented by public welfare assistance programs are not the business of this Court. The Constitution may impose certain procedural safeguards upon systems of welfare administration, Goldberg v. Kelly, ante, p. 397 U. S. 254. But the Constitution does not empower this Court to second-guess state officials charged with the difficult responsibility of allocating limited public welfare funds among the myriad of potential recipients. Cf. Steward Mach. Co. v. Davis, 301 U. S. 548, 301 U. S. 584-585; Helvering v. Davis, 301 U. S. 619, 301 U. S. 644.
Other schedules set the estimated cost of shelter in the various counties in Maryland. See id. Sched. B -- Plan A, p. 29; Sched. B -- Plan B, p. 30. The present schedules, which are substantially the same, appear in the Md. Manual of Dept. of Social Services, Rule 200, pp. 33, 35.
"B. Amount -- The amount of the grant is the resulting amount of need when resources are deducted from requirements as set forth in this Rule, subject to a maximum on each grant from each category: "
"1. $250 for local departments under any 'Plan A' of Shelter Schedule"
"2. $240 -- for local departments under any 'Plan B' of Shelter Schedule"
"a. If the requirements of a child over 18 are included to enable him to complete high school or training for employment (III-C-3), the grant may exceed the maximum by the amount of such child's needs."
"b. If the resource of support is paid as a refund (VI-B-6), the grant may exceed the maximum by an amount of such refund. This makes consistent the principle that the amount from public assistance funds does not exceed the maximum."
"c. The maximum may be exceeded by the amount of an emergency grant for items not included in a regular monthly grant. (VIII)"
"d. The maximum may be exceeded up to the amount of a grant to a person in one of the nursing homes specified in Schedule D, Section a."
"3. A grant is subject to any limitation established because of insufficient funds."
"[I]t is likewise settled that the appellee may, without taking a cross-appeal, urge in support of a decree any matter appearing in the record, although his argument may involve an attack upon the reasoning of the lower court or an insistence upon matter overlooked or ignored by it. By the claims now in question, the American does not attack, in any respect, the decree entered below. It merely asserts additional grounds why the decree should be affirmed."
When attention has been focused on other issues, or when the court from which a case comes has expressed no views on a controlling question, it may be appropriate to remand the case, rather than deal with the merits of that question in this Court. See Aetna Cas. & Sur. Co. v. Flowers, 330 U. S. 464, 330 U. S. 468; United States v. Ballard, 322 U. S. 78, 322 U. S. 88. That is not the situation here, however. The issue having been fully argued both here and in the District Court, consideration of the statutory claim is appropriate. Bondholders Committee v. Commissioner, 315 U. S. 189, 315 U. S. 192 n. 2; H. Hart & H. Wechsler, The Federal Courts and the Federal System 1394 (1953). See also Jaffke v. Dunham, 352 U. S. 280.
"The term 'dependent child' means a needy child (1) who has been deprived of parental support or care by reason of the death, continued absence from the home, or physical or mental incapacity of a parent, and who is living with his father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, brother, sister, stepfather, stepmother, stepbrother, stepsister, uncle, aunt, first cousin, nephew, or niece, in a place of residence maintained by one or more of such relatives as his or their own home, and (2) who is (A) under the age of eighteen, or (b) under the age of twenty-one and (as determined by the State in accordance with standards prescribed by the Secretary) a student regularly attending a school, college, or university, or regularly attending a course of vocational or technical training designed to fit him for gainful employment."
42 U.S.C. § 606(a) (1964 ed., Supp. IV), supra, n 8, formerly § 406, 49 Stat. 629, as amended, § 321, 70 Stat. 850. See also S.Rep. No. 628, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 16-17 (1935).
42 U.S.C. § 606(a) (1964 ed., Supp. IV), n 8, supra.
"When States are unable to meet need as determined under their standards, they reduce payments on a percentage or flat reduction basis. . . . These types of limitations may be used in the absence of, or in conjunction with, legal or administrative maximums. A maximum limits the amount of assistance that may be paid to persons whose determined need exceeds that maximum, whereas percentage or flat reductions usually have the effect of lowering payments to most or all recipients to a level below that of determined need."
"If the Secretary finds that the operation of a uniform maximum limits payments to families of more than one size, he may adjust the amount otherwise determined under clause (i) to take account of families of different sizes."
Cf. Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U. S. 618, where, by contrast, the Court found state interference with the constitutionally protected freedom of interstate travel.
It is important to note that there is no contention that the Maryland regulation is infected with a racially discriminatory purpose or effect such as to make it inherently suspect. Cf. McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U. S. 184.
Assuming, as the Court apparently does, that individual welfare recipients can bring an action against state welfare authorities challenging an aspect of the State's welfare plan as inconsistent with the provisions of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 601-610 (1964 ed. and Supp. IV), even though the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare has determined, as he has here, that the federal and state provisions are consistent, cf. Rosado v. Wyman, ante, p. 397 U. S. 430 (BLACK, J., dissenting), I join in the opinion of the Court in this case.
I join the Court's opinion, with one reservation which I deem called for by certain implications that might be drawn from the opinion. As I stated in dissent in Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U. S. 618, 394 U. S. 658-663 (1969), I find no solid basis for the doctrine there expounded that certain statutory classifications will be held to deny equal protection unless justified by a "compelling" governmental interest, while others will pass muster if they meet traditional equal protection standards. See also my dissenting opinion in Katzenbach v. Morgan, 384 U. S. 641, 384 U. S. 660-661 (1969). Except with respect to racial classifications, to which unique historical considerations apply, see Shapiro, at 394 U. S. 659, I believe the constitutional provisions assuring equal protection of the laws impose a standard of rationality of classification, long applied in the decisions of this Court, that does not depend upon the nature of the classification or interest involved.
It is on this basis, and not because this case involves only interests in "the area of economics and social welfare," ante at 397 U. S. 485, that I join the Court's constitutional holding.
children, should receive $296.15 per month. Appellees Gary should receive $331.50 for themselves and their eight children. Instead, these appellees received the $250 maximum grant.
"There is no question that States have considerable latitude in allocating their AFDC resources, since each State is free to set its own standard of need and to determine the level of benefits by the amount of funds it devotes to the program."
That dictum, made in the context of a case that dealt with Alabama's "substitute father" regulation, does little to clarify the limits of state authority. The holding in King was that the Alabama regulation, which denied AFDC benefits to the children of a mother who "cohabited" in or outside her home with an able-bodied man, was invalid because it defined "parent" in a manner inconsistent with § 406(a) of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. § 606(a) (1964 ed., Supp. IV). The Court rejected the State's contention that its regulation was "a legitimate way of allocating its limited resources available for AFDC assistance." 392 U.S. at 392 U. S. 318. Thus, whatever else may be said of the "latitude" extended to States in determining the benefits payable under AFDC, the holding in King makes clear that it does not include restrictions on the payment of benefits that are incompatible with the Social Security Act.
by the States at present, however, are percentage reductions and grant maximums. See Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW), State Maximums and Other Methods of Limiting Money Payments to Recipients of the Special Types of Public Assistance, Oct.1968, Tables 2, 3 (NCSS Report D-3). Grant maximums, in which payments are made according to need but subject to a stated dollar maximum, are of two types: individual maximums and family maximums. Only the latter type is at issue in the present case. Percentage reductions involve payments of a fixed percentage of actual need as determined by the State's need standard.
"enabling each State to furnish financial assistance and rehabilitation and other services, as far as practicable under the conditions in such State. . . ."
(Emphasis added.) It is significant in this respect that the Court in King referred only to a State's determination of the level of benefits "by the amount of funds it devotes to the [AFDC] program." 392 U.S. at 392 U. S. 318-319 (emphasis added). The language of § 401 and the language of the Court in King both reflect a concern that the Federal Government not require a state legislature to appropriate more money for welfare purposes than it is willing and able to appropriate. The use of the matching formula in § 403 of the Act, 42 U.S.C. § 603 (1964 ed., Supp. IV), supports this deference to the fiscal decisions of state legislatures. The question of a State's authority to pay less than its standard of need, however, has never been expressly decided.
"Maximums, whether so many dollars per individual or a total number of dollars per family, have an arbitrary aspect lacking from ratable reductions, since their application means that one family or individual will receive a smaller proportion of the amounts he is determined to need under the state's test than another family or individual. Where percentage reductions are used, the payment of every family is reduced proportionately. . . . [T]his aspect explains why Congress might wish to distinguish between maximums and ratable reductions as a means of reducing a state's financial obligation and, at least inferentially, to disfavor the former."
"all individuals wishing to make application for aid to families with dependent children shall have opportunity to do so, and that aid to [families with] dependent children shall be furnished with reasonable promptness to all eligible individuals."
a decision not to take more applications or to keep eligible families on waiting lists until enough recipients could be removed from the assistance rolls to make a place for them. . . . [T]his difference in treatment accorded to eligible people results in undue hardship on needy persons, and is inappropriate in a program financed from Federal funds."
"the care of dependent children in their own homes or in the homes of relatives by enabling each State to furnish financial assistance and rehabilitation and other services, as far as practicable under the conditions in such State, to needy dependent children and the parents or relatives with whom they are living to help maintain and strengthen family life. . . ."
Act are in a very real sense measures for the security of children. . . ."
"In addition, however, there is great need for special safeguards for many underprivileged children. Children are in many respects the worst victims of the depression. . . ."
"Many of the children included in relief families present no other problem than that of providing work for the breadwinner of the family. These children will be benefited through the work relief program, and still more through the revival of private industry. But there are large numbers of children in relief families which will not be benefited through work programs or the revival of industry."
"These are the children in families which have been deprived of a father's support and in which there is no other adult than one who is needed for the care of the children. . . ."
"With no income coming in, and with young children for whom provision must be made for a number of years, families without a father's support require public assistance, unless they have been left with adequate means or are aided by friends and relatives. . . . Through cash grants adjusted to the needs of the family, it is possible to keep the young children with their mother in their own home, thus preventing the necessity of placing the children in institutions. This is recognized by everyone to be the least expensive and altogether the most desirable method for meeting the needs of these families that has yet been devised."
"Particularly in families with small children, it is necessary for the mother or another adult to be in the home full-time to provide proper care and supervision. Since the person caring for the child must have food, clothing, and other essentials, amounts allotted to the children must be used in part for this purpose if no other provision is made to meet her needs. . . ."
"To correct the present anomalous situation wherein no provision is made for the adult relative, and to enable States to make payments that are more nearly adequate, the bill would include the relative with whom the dependent child is living as a recipient for Federal matching purposes. . . ."
for [services to maintain and strengthen family life] for each child who receives aid to families with dependent children. . . ."
"Under the Social Security Act Amendments of 1962, an amendment was added to title IV requiring the State welfare agency to make a program for each child, identifying the services needed, and then to provide the necessary services. This has proven a useful amendment, for it has required the States to give attention to the children and to provide services necessary to carry out the plans for the individual child. . . . [T]he committee believes that it is essential to broaden the requirement for the program of services for each child to include the entire family. The committee bill would require, therefore, that the States establish a social services program for each AFDC family. Thus, there will be a broadened emphasis to include a recognition of the needs of all members of the family, including 'essential persons.'"
to meet those needs, as well as the definition of those individuals eligible to receive this aid, have expanded over the years. At first, only financial assistance was available. Now "family services" programs have been added. [Footnote 2/2] In each case, however, the concern has been with meeting the needs of each eligible recipient.
treatment of recipients and uniform administration of a program within a State. . . ."
"the maximum grant regulation provides a powerful economic incentive to break up large families by placing 'dependent children' in excess of those whose subsistence needs, when added to the subsistence needs of other members of the family, exceed the maximum grant, in the homes of persons included in the class of eligible relatives."
Mrs. Cary were to place two of their children between the ages of six and twelve with relatives, each child so placed would be eligible for assistance in the amount of $65.00 per month, and they and their six remaining children would still be eligible to receive the maximum grant of $250.00."
grant maximums with percentage reductions, but the two are, in fact, quite distinct devices for limiting welfare payments. If Congress wished to design a scheme under which each family received equal payments, irrespective of the size of the family, I see nothing that would prevent it from doing so. But that is not the scheme of Congress under the present Act.
"[A State plan for aid and services to needy families with children must] provide that, by July 1, 1969, the amounts used by the State to determine the needs of individuals will have been adjusted to reflect fully changes in living costs since such amounts were established, and any maximums that the State imposes on the amount of aid paid to families will have been proportionately adjusted."
grants was necessary to preserve the integrity of the cost of living adjustment required by the bill. No further significance can legitimately be read into that reference.
"The effect of this provision is to make it possible for protective payments to be made in behalf of certain ADC recipients in States in which there is a maximum limiting the amount of assistance an individual may receive. These are the cases in which the statutory maximum does not prevent need from being met in full according to the State's standards."
S.Rep. No. 1589, 87th Cong., 2d Sess., 14 (1962).
This reference to a state-imposed maximum can hardly be interpreted as a congressional approval of a family maximum grant. If anything, it implicitly disapproves the concept by withholding federal payments with respect to individuals receiving "protective payments" when a maximum grant operates to prevent these individuals from receiving the full amount of their state-determined need.
"If the Secretary [of HEW] finds that the operation of a uniform maximum limits payments to families of more than one size, he may adjust the amount otherwise determined . . . to take account of families of different sizes."
discussed above are clearly inadequate to overcome the long history of concern manifested in the AFDC provisions of the Social Security Act for meeting the needs of each eligible recipient, and the command of § 402(a)(10) of the Act to that effect.
"In view of the fact, however, that there is no indication from administrative decision, promulgated regulation, or departmental statement that the question of the conformity of maximum grants to the Act has been given considered treatment, we believe that the various actions and inactions on the part of HEW are not entitled to substantial, much less to decisive, weight in our consideration of the instant case."
decisive weight in the judicial determination of this question.
The benefits distributed under the AFDC program include "financial assistance and rehabilitation and other services." Social Security Act § 401. The term "aid to families with dependent children" is itself defined in § 406(b) of the Act, as "money payments with respect to, or . . . medical care in behalf of or any type of remedial care recognized under State law" in behalf of dependent children, the relatives with whom they live, and other "essential persons" residing with the relative and child.
"services to a family or any member thereof for the purpose of preserving, rehabilitating, reuniting, or strengthening the family, and such other services as will assist members of a family to attain or retain capability for the maximum self-support and personal independence."
"public social services which supplement, or substitute for, parental care and supervision for the purpose of (1) preventing or remedying, or assisting in the solution of problems which may result in the neglect, abuse, exploitation, or delinquency of children, (2) protecting and caring for homeless, dependent, or neglected children, (3) protecting and promoting the welfare of children of working mothers, and (4) otherwise protecting and promoting the welfare of children, including the strengthening of their own homes where possible or, where needed, the provision of adequate care of children away from their homes in foster family homes or day care or other child care facilities."
"with the objective of -- (i) assuring, to the maximum extent possible, that such relative, child, and individual will enter the labor force and accept employment so that they will become self-sufficient, and (ii) preventing or reducing the incidence of births out of wedlock and otherwise strengthening family life. . . ."
a candid recognition that the Court's decision today is wholly without precedent. I cannot subscribe to the Court's sweeping refusal to accord the Equal Protection Clause any role in this entire area of the law, and I therefore dissent from both parts of the Court's decision.
At the outset, it should be emphasized exactly what is involved in determining whether this maximum grant regulation is consistent with and valid under the federal law. In administering its AFDC program, Maryland has established its own standards of need, and they are not under challenge in this litigation. Indeed, the District Court specifically refused to require additional appropriations on the part of the State or to permit appellees to recover a monetary judgment against the State. At the same time, however, there is no contention, nor could there be any, that the maximum grant regulation is in any manner related to calculation of need. [Footnote 3/1] Rather, it arbitrarily cuts across state-defined standards of need to deny any additional assistance with respect to the fifth or any succeeding child in a family. [Footnote 3/2] In short, the regulation represents no less than the refusal of the State to give any aid whatsoever for the support of certain dependent children who meet the standards of need that the State itself has established.
Since its inception in the Social Security Act of 1935, the focus of the federal AFDC program has been to provide benefits for the support of dependent children of needy families with a view toward maintaining and strengthening family life within the family unit. As succinctly stated by the Senate Committee on Finance, "[t]he objective of the aid to dependent children program is to provide cash assistance for needy children in their own homes." [Footnote 3/3] In meeting these objectives, moreover, Congress has provided the outlines that the AFDC plan is to follow if a State should choose to participate in the federal program. The maximum grant regulation, however, does not fall within these outlines or accord with the purposes of the Act. And the Court, by approving it, allows for a complete departure from the congressional intent.
class of needy dependent children those whom it will aid. Yet the clear effect of the maximum grant regulation is to do just that, for the regulation creates, in effect, a class of otherwise eligible dependent children with respect to whom no assistance is granted.
It was to disapprove just such an arbitrary device to limit AFDC payments that Congress amended § 402(a)(10) in 1950 to provide that aid "shall be furnished with reasonable promptness to all eligible individuals." (Emphasis added.) Surely, as my Brother DOUGLAS demonstrates, this statutory language means at least that the State must take into account the needs of, and provide aid with respect to, all needy dependent children. Indeed, that was our assessment of the congressional design embodied in the AFDC program in King v. Smith, 392 U. S. 309, 392 U. S. 329-330, 392 U. S. 333 (1968).
The opinion of the Court attempts to avoid this reading of the statutory mandate by the conclusion that parents will see that all the children in a large family share in whatever resources are available so that all children "do receive some aid." And "[s]o long as some aid is provided to all eligible families and all eligible children, the statute itself is not violated." The Court also views sympathetically the State's contention that the "all eligible individuals" clause was designed solely to prevent discrimination against new applicants for AFDC benefits. I am unpersuaded, however, by the view that Congress simultaneously prohibited discrimination against one class of dependent children -- those in families not presently receiving benefits -- and at the same time sanctioned discrimination against another class -- those children in large families. Furthermore, the Court's interpretation would permit a State to impose a drastically reduced maximum grant limitation -- or, indeed, a uniform payment of, say, $25 per family per month -- as long as all families were subject to the rule.
Thus, merely by purporting to compute standards of need and granting some benefits to all eligible families, the State would comply with the federal law -- in spite of the fact that the needs of no or very few dependent children would thereby be taken into account in the actual assistance granted. I cannot agree that Congress intended that a State should be entitled to participate in the federally funded AFDC program under such circumstances.
maximum of $22 for every dependent child, although none of that amount is received by the needy family in the case of the fifth or sixth and succeeding children. The effect is to shift a greater proportion of the support of large families from the State to the Federal Government as the family size increases. Indeed, if the size of the family should exceed 11, the State would succeed in transferring the entire support burden for the family to the Federal Government, and even make a "profit" in the sense that it would receive more from the Federal Government with respect to the family than the $250 maximum that is actually paid to that family. It is impossible to conclude that Congress intended so incongruous a result. On the contrary, when Congress undertook to subsidize payments on behalf of each recipient -- including each dependent child -- it seems clear that Congress intended each needy dependent child to receive the use and benefit of at least the incremental amount of the federal subsidy paid on his account.
does not even dispute this effect. [Footnote 3/6] The Court answers by saying that the family relationship "may be attenuated, but it cannot be destroyed." Yet it was just this kind of attenuation that, as the legislative history conclusively demonstrates, [Footnote 3/7] Congress was concerned with eliminating in establishing the AFDC program. The Court's rationale takes a long step backward toward the time when persons were dependent upon the charity of their relative -- the very situation meant to be remedied by AFDC.
the Court explicitly relies on the failure of the Secretary to disapprove the Maryland welfare scheme. For if anything at all is completely clear in this area of the law, it is that the failure of HEW to cut off funds from a state program has no meaning at all. See Rosado v. Wyman, supra, at 397 U. S. 426 (DOUGLAS, J., concurring).
"we must not he guided by a single sentence or member of a sentence, but [should] look to the provisions of the whole law, and to its object and policy."
Richards v. United States, 369 U. S. 1, 369 U. S. 11 (1962). We concluded in King v. Smith, supra, after an extensive review of the AFDC program, that Congress "intended to provide programs for the economic security and protection of all children," and did not intend "arbitrarily to leave one class of destitute children entirely without meaningful protection." 392 U.S. at 3 392 U. S. 30. (Emphasis in original.) That reasoning is likewise applicable to the instant case, in which the maximum grant regulation excludes consideration of the needs of a certain class of dependent children in large families. It is apparent, therefore, that Maryland's maximum grant regulation is not consistent with the Social Security Act, and hence appellees were entitled to the injunction they obtained against its operation.
reaches the wrong result and lays down an insupportable test for determining whether a State has denied its citizens the equal protection of the laws.
Yet, as a general principle, individuals should not be afforded different treatment by the State unless there is a relevant distinction between them, and "a statutory discrimination must be based on differences that are reasonably related to the purposes of the Act in which it is found." Morey v. Doud, 354 U. S. 457, 354 U. S. 465 (1957). See Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe R. Co. v. Ellis, 165 U. S. 150, 165 U. S. 155 (1897). Consequently, the State may not, in the provision of important services or the distribution of governmental payments, supply benefits to some individuals while denying them to others who are similarly situated. See, e.g., Griffin v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, 377 U. S. 218 (1964).
In the instant case, the only distinction between those children with respect to whom assistance is granted and those children who are denied such assistance is the size of the family into which the child permits himself to be born. The class of individuals with respect to whom payments are actually made (the first four or five eligible dependent children in a family), is grossly underinclusive in terms of the class that the AFDC program was designed to assist, namely, all needy dependent children. Such underinclusiveness manifests "a prima facie violation of the equal protection requirement of reasonable classification," [Footnote 3/12] compelling the State to come forward with a persuasive justification for the classification.
Under the so-called "traditional test," a classification is said to be permissible under the Equal Protection Clause unless it is "without any reasonable basis."
Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61, 220 U. S. 78 (1911). [Footnote 3/13] On the other hand, if the classification affects a "fundamental right," then the state interest in perpetuating the classification must be "compelling" in order to be sustained. See, e.g., Shapiro v. Thompson, supra; Harper v. Board of Elections, 383 U. S. 663 (1966); McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U. S. 184 (1964).
This case simply defies easy characterization in terms of one or the other of these "tests." The cases relied on by the Court, in which a "mere rationality" test was actually used, e.g., Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S. 483 (1955), are most accurately described as involving the application of equal protection reasoning to the regulation of business interests. The extremes to which the Court has gone in dreaming up rational bases for state regulation in that area may, in many instances, be ascribed to a healthy revulsion from the Court's earlier excesses in using the Constitution to protect interests that have more than enough power to protect themselves in the legislative halls. This case, involving the literally vital interests of a powerless minority -- poor families without breadwinners -- is far removed from the area of business regulation, as the Court concedes. Why then is the standard used in those cases imposed here? We are told no more than that this case falls in "the area of economics and social welfare," with the implication that, from there, the answer is obvious.
"In determining whether or not a state law violates the Equal Protection Clause, we must consider the facts and circumstances behind the law, the interests which the State claims to be protecting, and the interests of those who are disadvantaged by the classification."
It is the individual interests here at stake that, as the Court concedes, most clearly distinguish this case from the "business regulation" equal protection cases. AFDC support to needy dependent children provides the stuff that sustains those children's lives: food, clothing, shelter. [Footnote 3/16] And this Court has already recognized several times that, when a benefit, even a "gratuitous" benefit, is necessary to sustain life, stricter constitutional standards, both procedural [Footnote 3/17] and substantive, [Footnote 3/18] are applied to the deprivation of that benefit.
Nor is the distinction upon which the deprivation is here based -- the distinction between large and small families -- one that readily commends itself as a basis for determining which children are to have support approximating subsistence and which are not. Indeed, governmental discrimination between children on the basis of a factor over which they have no control -- the number of their brothers and sisters -- bears some resemblance to the classification between legitimate and illegitimate children which we condemned as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause in Levy v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 68 (1968).
"to fit the total needs of the State's dependent children, as measured by the State's standards of their subsistence requirements, into an inadequate State appropriation."
"[t]he saving of welfare costs cannot justify an otherwise invidious classification." Shapiro v. Thompson, supra, at 394 U. S. 633. See Goldberg v. Kelly, ante, at 397 U. S. 266.
It is true that government in the United States, unlike certain other countries, has not chosen to make public aid available to assist families generally in raising their children. Rather, in this case, Maryland, with the encouragement and assistance of the Federal Government, has elected to provide assistance at a subsistence level for those in particular need -- the aged, the blind, the infirm, and the unemployed and unemployable, and their children. The only question presented here is whether, having once undertaken such a program, the State may arbitrarily select from among the concededly eligible those to whom it will provide benefits. And it is too late to argue that political expediency will sustain discrimination not otherwise supportable. Cf. Cooper v. Aaron, 358 U. S. 1 (1958).
Vital to the employment incentive basis found by the Court to sustain the regulation is, of course, the supposition that an appreciable number of AFDC recipients are, in fact, employable. For it is perfectly obvious that limitations upon assistance cannot reasonably operate a a work incentive with regard to those who cannot work or who cannot be expected to work. In this connection, Maryland candidly notes that "only a very small percentage of the total universe of welfare recipients are employable." The State, however, urges us to ignore the "total universe," and to concentrate attention instead upon the heads of AFDC families. Yet the very purpose of the AFDC program since its inception has been to provide assistance for dependent children. The State's position is thus that the State may deprive certain needy children of assistance to which they would otherwise be entitled in order to provide an arguable work incentive for their parents. But the State may not wield its economic whip in this fashion when the effect is to cause a deprivation to needy dependent children in order to correct an arguable fault of their parents.
Cf. Levy v. Louisiana, supra; King v. Smith, supra, at 392 U. S. 334-336 (DOUGLAS, J., concurring); Doe v. Shapiro, 302 F.Supp. 761 (D.C. Conn.1969), appeal dismissed, 396 U. S. 488 (1970).
must assume that the presence of the mother in the home can be less easily dispensed with in the case of large families, particularly where small children are involved, and alternative provisions for their care are accordingly more difficult to arrange. In short, not only has the State failed to establish that there is a substantial or even a significant proportion of AFDC heads of households as to whom the maximum grant regulation arguably serves as a viable and logical work incentive, but it is also indisputable that the regulation, at best, is drastically overinclusive, since it applies with equal vigor to a very substantial number of persons who, like appellees, are completely disabled from working.
defects. [Footnote 3/22] Moreover, it is relevant to note that both Congress and the State have adopted other measures that deal specifically with exactly those interests the State contends are advanced by the maximum grant regulation. Thus, for example, employable AFDC recipient are required to seek employment through the congressionally established Work Incentive Program, which provide an elaborate system of counseling, training, and incentive payments for heads of AFDC families. See generally 42 U.S.C. §§ 63644 (1964 ed., Supp. IV). [Footnote 3/23] The existence of these alternatives does not, of course, conclusively establish the invalidity of the maximum grant regulation. It is certainly relevant, however, in appraising the overall interest of the State in the maintenance of the regulation.
needy children the minimum subsistence standard of living, and it does so on the wholly arbitrary basis that they happen to be members of large families. One need not speculate too far on the actual reason for the regulation, for, in the early stages of this litigation, the State virtually conceded that it set out to limit the total cost of the program along the path of least resistance. Now, however, we are told that other rationales can be manufactured to support the regulation and to sustain it against a fundamental constitutional challenge.
However, these asserted state interests, which are not insignificant in themselves, are advanced either not at all or by complete accident by the maximum grant regulation. Clearly they could be served by measures far less destructive of the individual interests at stake. Moreover, the device assertedly chosen to further them is, at one and the same time, both grossly underinclusive -- because it does not apply at all to a much larger class in an equal position -- and grossly overinclusive -- because it applies so strongly against a substantial class as to which it can rationally serve no end. Were this a case of pure business regulation, these defects would place it beyond what has heretofore seemed a borderline case, see, e.g., Railway Express Agency v. New York, 336 U. S. 106 (1949), and I do not believe that the regulation can be sustained even under the Court's "reasonableness" test.
arbitrary and too unconnected to the asserted rationale, the impact on those discriminated against -- the denial of even a subsistence existence -- too great, and the supposed interests served too contrived and attenuated to meet the requirements of the Constitution. In my view, Maryland's maximum grant regulation is invalid under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. I would affirm the judgment of the District Court.
"the greater ability of large families -- because of the inherent economics of scale -- to accommodate their needs to diminished per capita payments."
"With no income coming in, and with young children for whom provision must be made for a number of years, families without a father's support require public assistance unless they have been left with adequate means or are aided by friends and relatives. . . . Through cash grants adjusted to the needs of the family, it is possible to keep the young children with their mother in their own home, thus preventing the necessity of placing the children in institutions. This is recognized by everyone to be the least expensive, and altogether the most desirable, method for meeting the needs of these families that has yet been devised."
In various briefs submitted both to this Court and to other courts in analogous litigation, the Secretary of HEW and the Solicitor General have taken the occasion to label family maximum grant regulations as "arbitrary," oppressive of large families, as resulting in "patently different treatment of individuals," and having received, at least inferentially, the disfavor of Congress. See, e.g., Memorandum for the United States as Amicus Curiae, Rosado v. Wyman, ante, p 397 U. S. 397; Brief of Robert H. Finch, Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare as Amicus Curiae, Lampton v. Bonin, 299 F.Supp. 336, 304 F.Supp. 1384 (D.C.E.D.La.1969); Brief of Robert H. Finch, Jefferson v. Hackney, 304 F.Supp. 1332 (D.C.N.D.Tex.1969). Hence, the views of HEW on the precise issue presented in he instant case are, at the very best, ambiguous, and quite possibly the opposite of what the Court ascribes to it.
See generally Van Alstyne, The Demise of the Right-Privilege Distinction in Constitutional Law, 81 Harv.L.Rev. 1439 (1968). Appellees do argue that their "fundamental rights" are infringed by the maximum grant regulation. They cite, for example, Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U. S. 535 (1942), for the proposition that the "right of procreation" is fundamental. This statement is no doubt accurate as far as it goes, but the effect of the maximum grant regulation upon the right of procreation is marginal and indirect, at best, totally unlike the compulsory sterilization law that was at issue in Skinner.
This is essentially what this Court has done in applying equal protection concepts in numerous cases, though the various aspects of the approach appear with a greater or lesser degree of clarity in particular cases. See, e.g., McLaughlin v. Florida, supra; Rinaldi v. Yeager, 384 U. S. 305 (1966); Carrington v. Rash, 380 U. S. 89 (1965); Douglas v. California, 372 U. S. 353 (1963); Skinner v. Oklahoma, supra.
"Thus, the crucial factor in this context -- a factor not present in the case of the blacklisted government contractor, the discharged government employee, the taxpayer denied a tax exemption, or virtually anyone else whose governmental entitlements are ended -- is that termination of aid pending resolution of a controversy over eligibility may deprive an eligible recipient of the very means by which to live while he waits."
"involved the immediate and pressing need for preservation of life and health of persons unable to live without public assistance, and their dependent children."

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