The Role of the Courts in Securing Welfare Rights and ...

Welfare Law CenterThompson, 67 the United States Supreme Court held that this was unconstitutional because itclassified people upon the basis of their exercising the fundamental constitutional right to migrate,and then penalized them for exercising that right. Because a fundamental right was involved,“strict scrutiny” was applied. The state could not come up with a legitimate reason, since theCourt said the real reason, trying to keep poor people from moving into a state was an invalidpurpose under the Constitution.In recent years a number of states have adopted provisions to provide lower benefits tonew state residents, and a provision of the federal welfare law approves such restrictions. Anumber of challenges were filed, and virtually all were successful in the lower courts. 68On May17, 1999 in a major victory, the Supreme Court agreed by a 7-2 vote in Saenz v. Roe 69 that suchrestrictions were unconstitutional because they violated the right to travel and resulted inunconstitutional discriminatory treatment of citizens of a state.Different benefit levels based on race. If different treatment is based upon race, thestrict scrutiny test is applied. So if a state said that African-Americans would get lower benefitsthan whites, that classification would be struck down.Texas paid much lower benefits in its AFDC program than its old-age program, eventhough most of the AFDC recipients were minorities and most of the elderly were white. InJefferson v. Hackney, 70 the Supreme Court said that this was not a denial of equal protection.The Court said that the “mere” fact that there was such a differential impact did not make thedifferent benefits levels unconstitutional. In order for the difference to be a violation of theConstitution, there has to be a showing there was an intention to discriminate. However, whereintent is shown courts have struck down the differential treatment. A welfare case involvingintentional racial discrimination was Whitfield v. Oliver. 71Discrimination against legal immigrants.State welfare laws denying benefitsto or imposing durational residency requirements on non-citizens residing lawfully in the countrywere invalidated in Graham v. Richardson. 72The court applied the strict scrutiny test becauseclassifications based on alienage are inherently suspect.May 1999⋅ 28 ⋅