Court Opinion

ID: 9430640
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:30:15.543989+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:25.404106
License: Public Domain

Justice Marshall,
dissenting.
This case demonstrates yet again the lack of vitality in this Court’s recent equal protection jurisprudence. See, e. g., Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, 473 U. S. 432, 455 *644(1985) (Marshall, J., concurring in judgment in part and dissenting in part); San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 1, 70 (1973) (Marshall, J., dissenting). In my view, when analyzing classifications affecting the receipt of governmental benefits, a court must consider “the character of the classification in question, the relative importance to individuals in the class discriminated against of the governmental benefits that they do not receive, and the asserted state interests in support of the classification.” Dandridge v. Williams, 397 U. S. 471, 521 (1970) (Marshall, J., dissenting). By contrast, the Court’s rigid, bipolar approach, which purports to apply rational-basis scrutiny unless a suspect classification is involved or the exercise of a fundamental right is impeded, see ante, at 638-639, puts legislative classifications impinging upon sensitive issues of family structure and survival on the same plane as a refusal to let a merchant hawk his wares on a particular street corner. I do not believe the equal protection component of the Due Process Clause could become such a blunt instrument.
The importance of the interests involved in this case can hardly be denied. The Court concludes that the challenged statute does not directly and substantially interfere with family living arrangements, cf. Moore v. East Cleveland, 431 U. S. 494 (1977) (plurality opinion), because it “does not order or prevent any group of persons from dining together,” ante, at 638. The Court relies, apparently, on the fact that the statute does not use criminal sanctions, but merely the loss of benefits, to influence family living decisions. It is a bit late in the day, however, to cut off due process analysis— be it procedural or substantive — by simply invoking such a distinction. See Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U. S. 254, 262 (1970); Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U. S. 618, 627 (1969).
The food stamp benefits at issue are necessary for the affected families’ very survival, and the Federal Government denies that benefit to families who do not, by preparing their *645meals together, structure themselves in a manner that the Government believes will minimize unnecessary expenditures. The importance of that benefit belies any suggestion that the Government is not directly and substantially influencing the living arrangements of families whose resources are so low that they must rely on their relatives for shelter. The Government has thus chosen to intrude into the family dining room — a place where I would have thought the right to privacy exists in its strongest form. What possible interest can the Government have in preventing members of a family from dining as they choose? It is simply none of the Government’s business.
The challenged classifications amount to a conclusive presumption that related families living under the same roof do all of their cooking together. Thus the regulation does not merely affect the important privacy interest in family living arrangements recognized in Moore, but the even more vital interest in survival. As Congress itself recognized, some separate families five in the same house but cannot prepare meals together because of different work schedules. See S. Rep. No. 97-504, p. 25 (1982). Others may lack sufficient plates and utensils to accommodate more than a few persons at once, or may have only one burner on their stove. These extended families simply lack the option of cooking and eating together. For them, the legislative presumption in this case does far greater damage than merely prescribing with whom they must dine. By assuming that they realize economies of scale that they in fact cannot achieve, the regulation threatens their lives and health by denying them the minimal benefits provided to all other families of similar income and needs.
Balanced against these vital interests is Congress’ undeniably legitimate desire to prevent fraud and waste in the food stamp program. The legislative presumption that Congress used, however, is related at best tenuously to the achievement of those goals. While I believe that our standard of *646review must take into consideration the importance of the individual interests affected, I have some doubt that the classification used here could pass even a rational-basis test. In United States Dept. of Agriculture v. Moreno, 413 U. S. 528 (1973), we held that a definition of “household” that excluded any living group containing an individual unrelated to any other member of the group did not rationally further the Government’s interest in preventing fraud in the food stamp program. Despite the Court’s attempts to distinguish this case from Moreno, the critical fact in both cases is that the statute drew a distinction that bears no necessary relation to the prevention of fraud. See id., at 535-536 (“denial of essential federal food assistance to all otherwise eligible households containing unrelated members” not rationally related to fraud prevention). In the present case, the Government has provided no justification for the conclusion that related individuals living together are more likely to lie about their living arrangements than are unrelated individuals. Nor has it demonstrated that fraudulent conduct by related households is more difficult to detect than similar abuses by unrelated households.
Congress stressed its desire to prevent fraud in the food stamp program, see H. R. Rep. No. 97-687, p. 25 (1982); H. R. Rep. No. 97-106, p. 50 (1981), and it classified the “household consolidation” provision as an antifraud measure. Nevertheless, the Committee Reports cite no hard evidence that related persons living together were in fact significant sources of fraud; the Committees merely determined that the Government could save money by “tightening] the definition of an eligible food stamp household.” S. Rep. No. 97-504, at 24. The House did hypothesize, in the course of considering the 1981 amendments, that an 18-year-old child living with his parents could declare himself a separate household for food stamp purposes, H. R. Rep. No. 97-106, at 119. If indeed that abuse widely existed, the resulting legislation, which lumped together all nonelderly parents and their off*647spring living under one roof as a “household,” provided a more than sufficient cure. Nevertheless, Congress proceeded to restrict eligibility even further the following year.
When it moved beyond the rule that merely grouped parents and children, and in the 1982 amendments grouped siblings together as well, Congress interfered substantially with the desires of demonstrably separate families to remain separate families. It did so, moreover, while recognizing that distinct families living together often are genuinely separate households, and that the food stamp program should permit separate families that are not related to live together but maintain separate households. S. Rep. No. 97-504, at 25. Congress nevertheless assumed that related families are less likely to be genuinely separate households than are unrelated families, and failed even to provide related families a chance to rebut the legislative presumption. In view of the importance to the affected families of their family life and their very survival, the Court’s extreme deference to this untested assumption is simply inappropriate. I respectfully dissent.