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Califano v. Westcott

Supreme Court of the United States · 1979 · Constitutional Law

Constitutional LawEqual ProtectionGender DiscriminationSocial Welfare BenefitsRemediesFifth AmendmentDue Process Clauseequal protection component

Facts

Section 407 of the Social Security Act provided AFDC-UF benefits to needy families whose children were deprived of support because of the unemployment of the father, but not the mother. The named appellees were married couples in Massachusetts whose families would have qualified for AFDC-UF or related Medicaid benefits if the unemployed breadwinning mother had been male, because the fathers lacked sufficient work history to satisfy the statute's unemployment criteria. They brought a class action alleging that the statute and regulations discriminated on the basis of sex. The District Court agreed, declared the statute unconstitutional insofar as it discriminated on the basis of sex, and ordered benefits extended to families made needy by the unemployment of the mother on the same terms as those with an unemployed father.

Issue

Whether § 407's limitation of AFDC-UF benefits to families with an unemployed father, but not an unemployed mother, violated the Fifth Amendment. If so, whether the proper remedy was to extend benefits to similarly situated families with unemployed mothers, and whether that extension could be limited to the family's principal wage-earner.

Rule

A federal statute that classifies on the basis of gender is unconstitutional unless the gender classification is substantially related to the achievement of important governmental objectives. When a federal benefits statute is unconstitutional because of underinclusion, a court may remedy the defect by extending coverage to the excluded class rather than nullifying the program, particularly where extension is the simpler and more equitable course and avoids hardship to existing beneficiaries.

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Congress creates a federal emergency cash-assistance program for needy two-parent households. The statute provides benefits when a child is deprived of support because the father lost his job, but not when the mother lost hers. In Phoenix, Elena Torres was the family’s primary earner before becoming unemployed, and her family is otherwise eligible.

Elena challenges the statute as unconstitutional sex discrimination. The government responds that the law does not discriminate against women because any denial affects the whole family unit, not Elena alone. How should a court rule?

Explanation. A federal statute that conditions eligibility on the sex of the qualifying parent triggers the Fifth Amendment’s equal protection component. The majority rejected the argument that a family-unit benefit is not gender-biased because its effect is shared by all family members. A law denying benefits to families in which the female spouse is the wage earner is still sex discrimination, even though the whole household feels the loss.