Opinion ID: 164228
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Application of Graham by the Majority

Text: 182 Given this background of the Court's consistent application of strict scrutiny to a state statute that discriminates between citizens and resident aliens, we turn to the majority's analysis. The majority first recognizes that a central holding of Graham is that state laws creating citizenalien classifications must meet strict scrutiny. Maj. op. at 1250. But the majority soon reverses and declares that Graham does not apply because we have specific Congressional authorization for the state's action, the PRWORA. Id. at 1251-52. As a result, the majority appears to have conflated the twin holdings of Graham, which has resulted in a misapplication of Graham's central tenet.
183 As indicated above, Graham held first, that we must subject a state's classifications based on alienage to close judicial scrutiny. 403 U.S. at 372, 91 S.Ct. 1848. The Court went on to hold that  [a]n additional reason  a state statute might not withstand constitutional scrutiny emerges from the area of federal-state relations, citing conflict with overriding national policies where the federal government has occupied the field with its superior authority. Id. at 376-78, 91 S.Ct. 1848 (emphasis supplied). As mentioned above, the plaintiffs do not argue that the statute violates the preemption prong of Graham. Plaintiffs' arguments stem from the discrete strict scrutiny holding of Graham. 184 The majority correctly concludes that Mathews does not apply, because [u]nlike Mathews, here we have a state-administered program.  Maj. op. at 1251-52 (emphasis supplied). While holding that a rational basis test applies to federal policy regarding an alien's eligibility for welfare programs, the Court recognized that a similar division by a State of the category of persons who are not citizens of that State into subcategories of United States citizens and aliens has no apparent justification. Mathews, 426 U.S. at 85, 96 S.Ct. 1883. As the majority indicates, the circuit cases applying rational basis to a federal statutory classification of aliens, as administered by a state, routinely recognize that the strict scrutiny standard does apply to Fourteenth Amendment equal protection challenges to a state's classification of aliens. Rodriguez v. United States, 169 F.3d 1342, 1347 (11th Cir.1999) (citing Graham ); Aleman v. Glickman, 217 F.3d 1191, 1199 n. 5 (9th Cir.2000) (recognizing that Mathews noted equal protection analysis ... involves significantly different considerations [when] it concerns the relationship between aliens and the States rather than between aliens and the Federal Government) (quoting Mathews, 426 U.S. at 84-85, 96 S.Ct. 1883) (alterations in original); City of Chicago v. Shalala, 189 F.3d 598, 605 (7th Cir.1999) (`The States enjoy no power with respect to the classification of aliens.') (quoting Plyler, 457 U.S. at 225, 102 S.Ct. 2382); see also Lewis v. Thompson, 252 F.3d 567, 583 (2d Cir.2001) (plaintiffs do not contest that rational basis scrutiny applies to federal classification of eligibility for welfare benefits to the extent that they are asserting harm to themselves). 185
186 Turning to the state courts that have applied restrictions and classifications based on alienage, the majority presents Aliessa v. Novello, 96 N.Y.2d 418, 730 N.Y.S.2d 1, 754 N.E.2d 1085 (2001), and Doe v. Comm'r of Transitional Assistance, 437 Mass. 521, 773 N.E.2d 404 (2002), as adopting contending approaches: Aliessa applied strict scrutiny to a state's termination of state Medicaid coverage for many qualified aliens, while Doe applied a rational basis analysis to state-made intra-alien classifications. Maj. op. at 1253. In fact, a closer reading of the cases reveals that the New York State Court of Appeals and the Massachusetts Supreme Court decisions are not incongruous, but are in fact, complementary and represent a consistent application of the Supreme Court's jurisprudence in the wake of Graham.
187 The New York State legislature enacted Social Service Law § 122, which terminated Medicaid for various non-qualified aliens and placed a five-year residency requirement for eligibility for state Medicaid benefits. This latter group included lawfully admitted permanent residents. 188 As the majority opinion points out, [t]he parties' equal protection arguments in Aliessa mirrored those of the parties in this case: the plaintiffs argued that the state law discriminated based on alienage and that strict scrutiny should apply, and the state argued that it was acting with Congress's permission and that rational-basis review was appropriate. Maj. op. at 1252-53. The New York Court of Appeals presented a convincing rejection of the New York statute at issue: 189 We conclude that section 122 is subject to — and cannot pass — strict scrutiny, notwithstanding title IV's authorization. Because title IV authorizes each State to extend the ineligibility period for Federal Medicaid beyond the mandatory five years and terminate Federal Medicaid eligibility for certain refugees and asylees after seven years ..., it is directly in the teeth of Graham insofar as it allows the States to  adopt divergent laws on the subject of citizenship requirements for federally supported welfare programs. ... Moreover, title IV goes significantly beyond what the Graham Court declared constitutionally questionable. In the name of national immigration policy, it impermissibly authorizes each State to decide whether to disqualify many otherwise eligible aliens from State Medicaid. Section 122 is a product of this authorization. In light of Graham and its progeny, title IV can give section 122 no special insulation from strict scrutiny review. Thus, section 122 must be evaluated as any other State statute that classifies based on alienage. We hold that section 122 violates the Equal Protection Clauses of the United States and New York State Constitutions insofar as it denies State Medicaid to otherwise eligible PRUCOLs and lawfully admitted permanent residents based on their status as aliens. 190 Aliessa, 730 N.Y.S.2d 1, 754 N.E.2d at 1098-99 (internal citation omitted) (emphasis supplied); see Maj. op. at 1252-54.
191 In Doe, the Massachusetts Supreme Court applied rational basis analysis to a supplemental benefits program that imposed a residency requirement on qualified aliens applying for benefits. A key difference in the Massachusetts Supreme Court's analysis, noted in the majority opinion only by a parenthetical, is that the program affected in Massachusetts was a supplemental benefits program that was open to only aliens and designed to benefit only aliens; that is, the program was enacted by the state legislature to supplement federal benefits that had been taken away from Massachusetts aliens by Congress. See Doe, 773 N.E.2d at 411 (It is undisputed that the Massachusetts Legislature was not required to establish the supplemental benefits program. It is also undisputed that the supplemental program provides no benefits to citizens, and that the only persons eligible for benefits are qualified aliens.). 192 The court held it axiomatic that the supplemental program crafted to restore benefits to aliens could not discriminate against aliens and in favor of citizens. Id. ([W]e are left to determine what standard of review to apply to a State law that does not discriminate between citizens and aliens.). Thus, noting the critical differences between the New York and Massachusetts statutes, 773 N.E.2d at 412, and heeding the admonitions of Nyquist that strict scrutiny applies to a statute that discriminate[s] only within the class of aliens, 432 U.S. at 8, 97 S.Ct. 2120, the Massachusetts Supreme Court determined that Aliessa's strict scrutiny review could not apply. See Doe, 773 N.E.2d at 412 (distinguishing Nyquist: Unlike the New York statute at issue there, the Massachusetts statute establishes a program open only to aliens, imposes a residency requirement on all who are qualified to apply for its benefits, and does not harm aliens by barring them from the benefits of the program.); id. at 413 (distinguishing Aliessa: Unlike the supplemental program created [by the Massachusetts Legislature], the amended New York State Medicaid program presented ... the very paradigm so definitively addressed in Graham. ). It is this distinction between the Colorado and Massachusetts statutes that mandates we view S.B. 03-176 through the lens of strict scrutiny. Thus, the Massachusetts court did not reach a decision inconsistent with Aliessa ; in fact, the court cited Aliessa with approval and carefully distinguished its holding. Id. at 413.