Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/100080/united-states-vs-oregon
Timestamp: 2017-12-15 23:46:52
Document Index: 355740855

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 17', '§ 2', '§ 1', '§ 1', '§ 1', '§ 1']

United States Vs Oregon - Citation 100080 - Court Judgment | LegalCrystal
LegalCrystal Citation legalcrystal.com/100080
Case Number 366 U.S. 643
united states v. oregon - 366 u.s. 643 (1961) u.s. supreme court united states v. oregon, 366 u.s. 643 (1961) united states v. oregon no. 329 argued april 25, 1961 decided may 29, 1961 366 u.s. 643 certiorari to te supreme court of oregon syllabus an oregon resident died in a united states veterans' administration hospital in oregon without a will or legal heirs, leaving a net estate of personal property. he had not entered into a contract with the united states concerning such property, and was mentally incompetent to do so. oregon claimed such property under its escheat law, and the united states claimed it under 38 u.s.c. (1952 ed.) § 17, which provides that, when a veteran dies in such a hospital without a will or.....
U.S. Supreme Court United States v. Oregon, 366 U.S. 643 (1961)
Held: the United States was entitled to the property as such trustee. Pp. 366 U. S. 643 -649.
(a) The federal statute operates automatically, and does not require that the veteran shall have entered into a contract with the United States. Pp. 366 U. S. 645 -648.
(b) The statute is within the power of Congress, and it does not violate the Tenth Amendment. Pp. 366 U. S. 648 -649.
that such property shall escheat to the State. [ Footnote 1 ] A United States statute, on the other hand, provides that, when a veteran dies without a will or legal heirs in a veterans' hospital, his personal property "shall immediately vest in and become the property of the United States as trustee for the sole use and benefit of the General Post Fund. . . ." [ Footnote 2 ] In reliance upon these provisions of their respective statutes, both the State of Oregon and the Government of the United States filed claims for Warpouske's estate in the Oregon probate court having jurisdiction of the matter.
incompetence. That court then accepted the State's interpretation of the federal statute as requiring a valid contract as a prerequisite to its application, and concluded that, since such a contract could not, in this case, have been made, the State was entitled to Warpouske's property by virtue of its escheat law. On appeal, the State Supreme Court affirmed on the same grounds. [ Footnote 3 ] Because of the importance of this question of federal statutory construction and an alleged conflict between this decision and decisions previously made by other state courts of final jurisdiction, [ Footnote 4 ] we granted certiorari. [ Footnote 5 ]
The controlling provision was passed in 1941 as an amendment to the Sundry Appropriations Act of 1910. [ Footnote 6 ] The 1910 Act quite plainly and unequivocally provided that the admission of an applicant to a veterans' home should
The contractual nature of these provisions of the 1910 Act was clear, and, indeed, we expressly recognized that fact when the question of the validity of the Act was brought before this Court. [ Footnote 7 ]
The 1910 Act was greatly amplified, however, by the amendments adopted in 1941, [ Footnote 8 ] and the central provision of the Act, quoted above, was significantly changed. Section 1 of the new Act restates this provision without reference to the word "contract," providing simply that, when a veteran dies "while a member or patient in any facility, or any hospital while being furnished care or treatment," all his personal property
"not disposed of by will or otherwise shall immediately vest in and become the property of the United States as trustee for the sole use and benefit of the General Post Fund. . . . [ Footnote 9 ]"
The Act then goes on to supplement this basic provision with other provisions that are drawn in the language of contract. But these provisions must be read in the context of § 2 of the Act, which provides that the death of a veteran in a veterans' hospital "shall give rise to a conclusive presumption of a valid contract." [ Footnote 10 ] Read in this context, the language of contract which appears in these other provisions of the Act is not at all inconsistent with the provision for automatic vesting without a contract in § 1. Quite the contrary, it seems plain to us that
these "contractual" provisions were included in the Act for the purpose of reinforcing, rather than detracting from, the provisions of § 1 -- the thought apparently being that there was some chance that the Act would be attacked as unconstitutional, and that it would consequently be advisable to include alternative bases upon which it could be upheld. [ Footnote 11 ]
This natural construction we give to § 1 makes it fit well in the pattern of legislation dealing with this subject. The solicitude of Congress for veterans is of long standing. [ Footnote 12 ] Veterans' pensions, homes, hospitals and other facilities have been supplied on an ever-increasing scale. Many veterans, as did the deceased veteran here, have had to depend upon these benefits for long periods of their lives. Warpouske, for example, appears to have spent more than ten years of his life at various intervals from time to time, in veterans' homes and hospitals throughout the country. These were the only homes he had at those times. The congressional plan here is that whatever little personal property veterans without wills or kin happen to leave when they die in veterans' homes and hospitals should be paid into the General Post Fund, to be used for the recreation and pleasure of other ex-service men and women who have to spend their days in veterans' homes and hospitals. This idea was expressed by Representative Jennings during the discussion of the 1941 Act on the floor of the House:
let . . . it go into a fund under the escheat laws of [a] State? [ Footnote 13 ]"
Having concluded that the provisions of § 1 are clear and unequivocal on their face, we find no need to resort to the legislative history of the Act. [ Footnote 14 ] Since the State has placed such heavy reliance upon that history, however, we do deem it appropriate to point out that this history is, at best, inconclusive. It is true, as the State points out, that Representative Rankin, as Chairman of the Committee handling the bill on the floor of the House, expressed his view during the course of discussion of the bill on the floor that the 1941 Act would not apply to insane veterans incompetent to make valid contracts. [ Footnote 15 ] But such statements, even when they stand alone, have never been regarded as sufficiently compelling to justify deviation from the plain language of a statute. They are even less so here, for there is powerful countervailing evidence as to the intention of those who drafted the bill. The bill was drawn up and sent to the Speaker of the House, in the very form in which it was passed, by the Veterans' Bureau itself. [ Footnote 16 ] And that Bureau, we are told, has consistently interpreted the 1941 Act as making the sanity or insanity of a veteran who dies in a veterans' hospital entirely irrelevant to the determination of the Government's rights under the Act.
power authorize Congress to require that the personal property left by its wards when they die in government facilities shall be devoted to the comfort and recreation of other ex-service people who must depend upon the Government for care. The fact that this law pertains to the devolution of property does not render it invalid. [ Footnote 17 ] Although it is true that this is an area normally left to the States, it is not immune under the Tenth Amendment from laws passed by the Federal Government which are, as is the law here, necessary and proper to the exercise of a delegated power. [ Footnote 18 ]
United States v. Stevens, 302 U. S. 623 , 302 U. S. 627 .
Cf. United States v. Bowen, 100 U. S. 508 , 100 U. S. 513 -514; National Home v. Wood, 299 U. S. 211 , 299 U. S. 216 .
See, e.g., Kolovrat v. Oregon, ante, p. 366 U. S. 187 . This was also implicit in the holding in United States v. Stevens, 302 U. S. 623 . See note 11 supra. Cf. Hines v. Lowrey, 305 U. S. 85 , in which this Court rejected the contention that the Federal Constitution does not confer any authority upon Congress to deal with mental incompetents.
See, e.g., Case v. Bowles, 327 U. S. 92 ; Oklahoma v. Atkinson Co., 313 U. S. 508 ; United States v. Darby, 312 U. S. 100 .
I do not see how this decedent's estate can constitutionally pass to the United States. The succession of real and personal property is traditionally a state matter under our federal system. Mager v. Grima, 8 How. 490, 49 U. S. 493 -494. That tradition continues. United States v. Burnison, 339 U. S. 87 , 339 U. S. 91 -92; Clark v. Allen, 331 U. S. 503 , 331 U. S. 517 ; Irving Trust Co. v. Day, 314 U. S. 556 , 314 U. S. 562 ; Lyeth v. Hoey, 305 U. S. 188 , 305 U. S. 193 . An individual can contract away his assets -- making the United States the promisee -- and the contract will be enforced, provided it
is valid under state law. United States v. Stevens, 302 U. S. 623 , 302 U. S. 627 . It may be that an action in quantum meruit would lie against the estate of a person who, though utterly incompetent as Adam B. Warpouske concededly was, received treatment at a federal hospital. [ Footnote 2/1 ] It may be that the United States could appropriate all unexpended funds from federal pensions or federal insurance policies in exchange for the services rendered an incompetent. See United States v. Hall, 98 U. S. 343 ; Wissner v. Wissner, 338 U. S. 655 ; cf. Miller Music Corp. v. Charles N. Daniels, Inc., 362 U. S. 373 . The power of Congress to legislate concerning the claims of all veterans, whether competent or incompetent, is well settled. Hines v. Lowrey, 305 U. S. 85 .
We deal here, however, with an inheritance that the incompetent veteran received from his brother -- an estate worth about $13,000. How Congress can provide for that sum to pass to the United States is difficult to understand. Oregon has provided how the property of one who dies intestate and without heirs shall be distributed, [ Footnote 2/2 ] and that is its constitutional right under the Tenth Amendment. Never before, I believe, has a federal law governing the property of one dying intestate been allowed to override a state law. Some state inheritance laws are affected by federal policy, as we recently held in Kolovrat v. Oregon, ante, p. 366 U. S. 187 . Thus, where a treaty
We know that, while the Act is based on "a conclusive presumption" that a contract to assign the property to the United States was made, there was, in fact, no contract in this case. During the period of Warpouske's hospitalization -- from March 1, 1956, to March 19, 1956, the day of his death -- he was either comatose or semi-comatose. [ Footnote 2/3 ] We deal with a presumption that is contrary to the fact ( cf. Tot v. United States, 319 U. S. 463 ). We have then a case involving the power of Congress to provide for the administration of the estate of a deceased veteran where he has, in fact, made no assignment of it to the Federal Government. To what power is that necessary and proper?
Only recently, we warned against an expansive construction of the Necessary and Proper Clause. We stated that it is "not itself a grant of power, but a caveat that the Congress possesses all the means necessary to carry out" the powers specifically granted. Kinsella v. Singleton, 361 U. S. 234 , 361 U. S. 247 . Powers not given "were reserved," as Madison said. VI Writings of James Madison (Hunt ed.) 390. And "no powers were given beyond those enumerated in the Constitution, and such as were fairly incident to them." Ibid.
The Tenth Amendment does not, of course, dilute any power delegated to the national government. That is one face of the truism that runs through our decisions. United States v. Darby, 312 U. S. 100 , 312 U. S. 124 ; Oklahoma v. Atkinson Co., 313 U. S. 508 , 313 U. S. 534 ; Case v. Bowles, 327 U. S. 92 , 327 U. S. 101 . But when the Federal Government enters a field as historically local as the administration of decedents' estates, some clear relation of the asserted power to one of the delegated powers should be shown. At times, the exercise of a delegated power reaches deep into local problems. Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U. S. 111 , allowed the commerce power to extent to home-grown and home-used wheat, because total control was essential for effective control of the interstate wheat market. But there is no semblance of likeness here. The need of the Government to enter upon the administration of veterans' estates -- made up of funds not owing from the United States -- is no crucial phase of the ability of the United States to care for ex-service men and women or to manage federal fiscal affairs.
Federal Government (as most people do today) is not among the enumerated powers. At bottom of the present statute, as the Court points out, is a desire to make those who use a Veterans' Hospital help finance its operations. [ Footnote 2/4 ] Congress can set rates for services rendered; it can obtain from patients assignments of assets to the United States; it can induce and encourage people to make these hospitals beneficiaries under their wills. But I do not see how it is possible for the United States to take a man's property without his consent when the United States is not a creditor in the accepted sense. The only constitutional way in which that can be done is by taxation or by condemnation. This law as applied is indeed a levy that has no support in the Constitution, and it makes a serious inroad on the Tenth Amendment. With all deference, I dissent.