ALEMAN V. GLICKMAN:  DISPARATE TREATMENT OF MARRIAGES ENDING IN DIVORCE AND DEATH DOESN'T VIOLATE EQUAL PROTECTION
Immigrants' Rights Update, Vol. 14, No. 5, August 31, 2000

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has ruled that in treating marriages ending in divorce differently from those ending in death for purposes of determining noncitizens' eligibility for food stamps, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) does not violate the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause.  In rejecting the appellant's equal protection challenge, the court found that the government's disparate treatment of two otherwise identical groups of noncitizens has a rational basis.

Under the PRWORA, lawful permanent residents who can claim 40 quarters (or 10 years) of work history are exempted from the proscription on food stamp eligibility that the law applies to most LPRs.  The law also provides that LPRs who have less than 40 quarters' credit can obtain the exemption in one or both of the two following ways:  (1) they may claim for themselves credit for quarters earned by their parents if those quarters were earned before they turned 18; or (2) LPRs can claim quarters earned by their spouse during the marriage as long as they remain married to the spouse or such spouse is deceased.

As an LPR whose husband worked 40 quarters but whose marriage to him ended in divorce, the appellant in this case—Ms. Celia Aleman—lost her food stamp eligibility in September 1997.  On Jan. 16, 1998, Aleman filed suit in federal district court challenging on equal protection grounds the welfare law provision governing individuals' ability to claim work quarters earned by their spouses.  Five months later, Aleman's food stamp eligibility was restored when the Agricultural Research, Extension, and Education Reform Act of 1998 (AREERA) was enacted.  Her only remaining claim was for a retroactive award of food stamp benefits covering the 13-month period that ended Nov. 1, 1998, the date on which the AREERA provisions restoring eligibility took effect.

Arguing that Aleman's complaint failed to state an equal protection violation, the government moved for dismissal.  The district court granted the motion, agreeing that the PRWORA's qualifying quarters provision is supported by a rational basis.

In ruling on Aleman's appeal, the Ninth Circuit began its analysis by citing the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Mathews v. Diaz as controlling authority for the case.  Deferring to the legislative and executive branches' sole responsibility to regulate matters concerning alienage, the Diaz Court held that only a narrow standard of review could properly be applied to decisions made by the Congress or the president concerning immigration and naturalization.  Under that standard, the Court ruled that the federal statutory classification at issue in Diaz (which, like the PRWORA's 40 quarters provision, discriminated among noncitizens in the distribution of welfare benefits) did not violate equal protection because it was not "wholly irrational."  The appeals court noted that it, as well as the Seventh and Eleventh Circuits, has since equated the Supreme Court's use of "wholly irrational" in Diaz to the rational basis test.

Although the Ninth Circuit conceded that the classification of noncitizens embodied in the PRWORA's 40 quarters provision "is not a model of legislative logic and, as in this case, can operate quite harshly to deprive deserving persons of the means of subsistence," the court nonetheless ruled that the classification survives the "exceedingly low level of review mandated by the rational basis test."  Congress acted rationally, the court held, in seeking to reward noncitizens who have contributed to U.S. society via their 40 quarters of work credit.  Moreover, the Ninth Circuit ruled, it was also rational of Congress to limit this benefit to widowed spouses, who are more likely to have been financially dependent on the deceased spouse than a divorcee on a wage-earning ex-spouse.  Last, the court ruled that because the classification helps decrease duplicative expenses stemming from program administration, it "is rationally related to the legitimate congressional purpose of achieving cost savings in the food stamp program."

Aleman v. Glickman, __ F.3d __ , No. 98-16893 (9th Cir. July 17, 2000).