Court Opinion

ID: 9488154
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:37:37.940517+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:43.418857
License: Public Domain

TROTT, Circuit Judge,
Concurring.
From a policy point of view, the end result in this case appears — to me at least — to be nonsensical. The State is picking up the bill for the hospitalized patients’ necessities, but cannot obtain reimbursement from the patients’ available funds if the patients resist. Thus, a recalcitrant patient receiving social security payments could pile up in about ten years an untouchable bank account of $250,-000 while requiring taxpayers to foot the bill for the costs of his hospitalization. The justification for such a result escapes me, and the upshot of our decision hardly seems consistent with the purpose of the Social Security Act. Could Congress have intended this outcome?
Nevertheless, Judge Tang’s conclusion seems to be compelled by Brinkman v. Rohm, 878 F.2d 263 (9th Cir.1989) (per curiam). 42 U.S.C. § 407 as construed by Bennett v. Arkansas, 485 U.S. 395, 108 S.Ct. 1204, 99 L.Ed.2d 455 (1988) (per curiam), says what it says, and we should be loath to constrict the catchall words, “or other legal process” to allow the state access to a patient-debtor’s money. If the patient-debtor were not under the absolute control of the state, a process such as execution, levy, attachment, garnishment, or some “other legal process,” would be needed to get at his funds. But, because in this instance the state controls both the patient and his money, the state need not resort to such devices, as this case demonstrates. Under these circumstances, permitting the state to say, as it does, that taking money from people who don’t want to give it up is not “legal process” sounds too much like a construction out of Bleak House, or the parchment stuff that animated Dick the Butcher in Henry the Sixth, Part 2. The end ultimately may be palatable, but the state’s recommended manner of achieving it is not. California’s goal may well be reachable, but we cannot get there from here without a sturdy legislative bridge. Thus, the answer to California’s problem lies not in the courts but in Congress where, who knows, my analysis may prove to be misguided. Accordingly, I concur in Judge Tang’s opinion.
ORDER
Aug. 25, 1995
Pursuant to appellants’ motion, which ap-pellees have not opposed, the opinion filed June 7, 1995 is amended as follows:
*1170[Editor’s Note: Amendments incorporated for purpose of publication.]
IT IS SO ORDERED.