Court Opinion

ID: 9847782
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:07:23.382341+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:33.012156
License: Public Domain

TEIGEN, Judge
(dissenting).
I dissent. The regulation of the Social Service Board found in Chapter 330, § 3, |f 3, of the Social Work Manual, read in the light of the rest of that chapter, and § 1902(b)(3) of Title XIX of the Social Security Act, § 1396a(b) (3) of 42 U.S.C.A., and Federal Regulation § 248.40, Title 45, Code of Federal Regulations, is not, in my opinion, unconstitutional as being violative of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, nor was it being unconstitutionally applied in this case.
I agree that the right of interstate travel has repeatedly been recognized as a basic constitutional freedom: However, this right to travel was involved in only a limited sense in Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969), the case upon which the majority rely. In Memorial Hospital v. Maricopa County, -U.S. -, 94 S.Ct. 1076, 39 L.Ed.2d 306 (1974), the United States Supreme Court held that the durational residence requirement of an Arizona statute requiring a year’s residence in a county as a condition for receiving nonemergency hospitalization or medical care at the county’s expense by an indigent was unconstitutional, as it created an “invidious classification.” In that case the court points out the scope of right to travel, as limited in Shapiro, as follows:
“The Court was there concerned only with the right to ‘migrate, with intent to settle and abide’ or, as the Court put it, ‘to migrate, resettle, find a new job and *716start a new life.’ 394 U.S., at 629, 89 S.Ct. at 1328. Even a bona fide residence requirement would burden the right to travel, if travel meant merely movement. But, in Shapiro, the Court explained that ‘[t]he residence requirement and the one-year waiting-period requirement are distinct and independent prerequisites’ for assistance and only the latter was held to be unconstitutional. 394 U.S., at 636, 89 S.Ct. at 1332. Later, in invalidating a durational residency requirement for voter registration on the basis of Shapiro, we cautioned that our decision was not intended to ‘cast doubt on the validity of appropriately defined and uniformly applied bona fide residence requirements.’ Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 342 n. 13, 92 S.Ct. 995, 1003, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972).” Memorial Hospital v. Maricopa County, supra, - U.S. at -, 94 S.Ct. at 1080.
In Starns v. Malkerson, 326 F.Supp. 234 (D.C.1970), aff’d 401 U.S. 985, 91 S.Ct. 1231, 28 L.Ed.2d 527 (1971), and Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U.S. 441, 93 S.Ct. 2230, 37 L.Ed.2d 63 (1973), the - United States Supreme Court upheld, as constitutional, durational residence requirements for instate university tuition.
It is also noted in Memorial Hospital, - U.S. at —, 94 S.Ct. at 1081, in further commenting on Shapiro:
“Although any durational residence requirement impinges to some extent on the right to travel, the Court in Shapiro did not declare such requirements to be per se unconstitutional. The Court’s holding was conditioned, at 394 U.S. 638 n. 21, 89 S.Ct. 1333, by the caveat that some ‘waiting-period or residence requirements] * * * may not be penalties upon the exercise of the constitutional right of interstate travel.’ The amount of impact required to give rise to the compelling state interest test was not made clear. The Court spoke of the requisite impact in two ways. First, we considered whether the waiting period would deter migration:

“Second, the Court considered the extent to which the residency requirement served to penalize the exercise of the right to travel.”
In further commenting on Shapiro and making reference to Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972), the high court said:
“ ‘Shapiro did not rest upon a finding that denial of welfare actually deterred travel. Nor have other “right to travel” cases in this Court always relied on the presence of actual deterrence. In Shapiro we explicitly stated that the compelling state interest test would be triggered by “any classification which serves to penalize the right [to travel], * * * » > >y
Thus in concluding the effect of Shapiro and Dunn in Memorial Hospital, the Supreme Court said: “Shapiro and Dunn stand for the proposition that a classification which ‘operates to penalize those persons * * * who have exercised their constitutional right of interstate migration,’ must be justified by a compelling state interest. Oregon v. Mitchell, 400 U.S. 112, 238, 91 S.Ct. 260, 321, 27 L.Ed.2d 272 (1971).”
In Shapiro the court found denial of the basic “necessities of life” to be a penalty. In Memorial Hospital, the court held that medical care is as much “a basic necessity of life” to an indigent as welfare assistance. However, under requirements provided in 45 C.F.R., § 248.40, quoted in the majority opinion, the state plan under Title XIX of the Social Security Act must provide that:
“(2) Medical care and services will be provided outside the State to eligible residents of the State, at least in the following situations:
“(i) When it is general practice for residents of a particular locality to use medical resources outside the State ⅜ ⅝ 5⅜⅞
For these reasons we have neither of the required elements of durational residence *717or penalty required under Shapiro, Dunn or Memorial Hospital in this case. It is not disputed that the North Dakota or the Minnesota plan for medical assistance to needy persons has been approved by the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare and complies with C.F.R. requirements. The problem is that the proceedings in this case were started against the wrong party, which, unfortunately, came about because Nielsen is represented by a representative of the Legal Aid Society of North Dakota, Inc., who, on oral argument before this court, admitted that, by regulation, he is prohibited from representing any person who is not a resident of North Dakota. Thus he was precluded, by the regulations of his employer, from commencing a suit on behalf of Nielsen against the Social Service Board of Minnesota, or its counterpart, to compel continuation of medical assistance payments to Nielsen under the Minnesota plan.
Nielsen resided in the small town of Wolverton, in Wilkin County, Minnesota, which is located about twenty miles from the city of Fargo, North Dakota. He had been a recipient of medical assistance from the state of Minnesota for a number of years. On March 17, 1972, when he could no longer be cared for by his mother in her home he was moved, on the advice of his physician, to the Elim Nursing Home in Fargo, North Dakota. The Wilkin County Welfare Board of Minnesota then terminated Nielsen’s medical assistance payments, effective May 1, 1972. There is no question but that the people of Wolver-ton and Wilkin County utilize the medical resources located immediately across the border in Fargo, which is the largest city serving that area.
I agree that the Social Service Board, in the trial of this matter, neglected to introduce evidence firmly establishing the general practice of residents of the locality to use the medical resources located at Fargo, but this is a commonly known fact. Wol-verton, Minnesota, is considered a part of the trade territory of the city of Fargo, particularly for medical purposes.
Under the circumstances, I believe that the case should be remanded for new trial, with directions to take evidence on this question and with permission to implead or interplead the appropriate agency of the state of Minnesota after a transfer of the case from state to federal court, or such other procedural steps as may be meet in the premises, to fully litigate the issues involved.
KNUDSON, J., dissents.