MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST delivered the opinion of the Court.
Appellants, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, its Secretary, the Social Security Administration and various of its officials, appeal from a decision of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California invalidating duration-of-relationship
That court concluded that it had jurisdiction of the action by virtue of 28 U. S. C. § 1331, and eventually certified the case as a class action. On the merits, it concluded that the nine-month requirements of §§ 216 (c) (5) and (e) (2) of the Social Security Act, 49 Stat. 620, as added, 64 Stat. 510, and as amended, 42 U. S. C. §§ 416 (c) (5) and (e) (2) (1970 ed. and Supp. III), constituted "irrebuttable presumptions" which were constitutionally invalid under the authority of Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, 414 U.S. 632 (1974); Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U.S. 441 (1973); and Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645 (1972). We hold that the District Court did not have jurisdiction of this action under 28 U. S. C. § 1331, and that while it had jurisdiction of the claims of the named appellees under the provisions of 42 U. S. C. § 405 (g), it had no jurisdiction over the claims asserted on behalf of unnamed class members. We further decide that the District Court was wrong on the merits of the constitutional question tendered by the named appellees.
I
Appellee Salfi married the deceased wage earner, Londo L. Salfi, on May 27, 1972. Despite his alleged apparent good health at the time of the marriage, he suffered a heart attack less than a month later, and died on November 21, 1972, less than six months after the marriage. Appellee Salfi filed applications for mother's insurance benefits for herself and child's insurance benefits for her daughter by a previous marriage, appellee Doreen Kalnins.
A three-judge District Court heard the case on cross-motions for summary judgment, and granted substantially all of the relief prayed for by appellees. The District Court rendered a declaratory judgment holding the challenged statute to be unconstitutional, certified a class consisting of "all otherwise eligible surviving spouses and stepchildren . . . heretofore disqualified from receipt of . . . benefits by operation" of the duration-of-relationship requirements, enjoined appellants from denying benefits on the basis of those requirements, and ordered them to provide such benefits "from the time of
In addition to their basic contention that the duration-of-relationship requirements pass constitutional muster, appellants present several contentions bearing on the scope of the monetary relief awarded by the District Court. They contend that the award is barred by sovereign immunity insofar as it consists of retroactive benefits, that regardless of sovereign immunity invalidation of the duration-of-relationship requirements should be given prospective effect only, and that the District Court did not properly handle certain class-action issues. Because we conclude that the duration-of-relationship requirements are constitutional, we have no occasion to reach the retroactivity and class-action issues. We are confronted, however, by a serious question as to whether the District Court had jurisdiction over this suit.
II
The third sentence of 42 U. S. C. § 405 (h) provides in part:
On its face, this provision bars district court federal-question jurisdiction over suits, such as this one, which
That the third sentence of § 405 (h) is more than a codified requirement of administrative exhaustion is plain from its own language, which is sweeping and direct and which states that no action shall be brought under § 1331, not merely that only those actions shall be brought in which administrative remedies have been exhausted. Moreover, if the third sentence is construed to be nothing more than a requirement of administrative exhaustion, it would be superfluous. This is because the first two sentences of § 405 (h), which appear in the margin,
It has also been argued that Johnson v. Robison, 415 U.S. 361 (1974), supports that proposition that appellees are not seeking to recover on a claim arising under Title II. In that case we considered 38 U. S. C. § 211 (a), which provides:
We were required to resolve whether this language precluded an attack on the constitutionality of a statutory limitation. We concluded that it did not, basically because such a limitation was not a "decision" of the Administrator "on any question of law or fact"; indeed, the "decision" had been made by Congress, not the Administrator, and the issue was one which the Administrator considered to be beyond his jurisdiction. 415 U. S., at 367-368. Thus the question sought to be litigated was simply not within § 211 (a)'s express language, and there was accordingly no basis for concluding
The language of § 405 (h) is quite different. Its reach is not limited to decisions of the Secretary on issues of law or fact. Rather, it extends to any "action" seeking "to recover on any [Social Security] claim"—irrespective of whether resort to judicial processes is necessitated by discretionary decisions of the Secretary or by his non-discretionary application of allegedly unconstitutional statutory restrictions.
There is another reason why Johnson v. Robison is inapposite. It was expressly based, at least in part, on the fact that if § 211 (a) reached constitutional challenges to statutory limitations, then absolutely no judicial consideration of the issue would be available. Not only would such a restriction have been extraordinary, such that "clear and convincing" evidence would be required before we would ascribe such intent to Congress, 415 U. S., at 373, but it would have raised a serious constitutional question of the validity of the statute as so construed. Id., at 366-367. In the present case, as will be discussed below, the Social Security Act itself provides jurisdiction for constitutional challenges to its provisions. Thus the plain words of the third sentence of § 405 (h) do not preclude constitutional challenges. They simply require that they be brought under jurisdictional grants contained in the Act, and thus in conformity with the same standards which are applicable to nonconstitutional claims arising under the Act. The result is not only of unquestionable constitutionality, but it is also manifestly reasonable, since it assures the Secretary the opportunity prior to constitutional litigation to ascertain, for example, that the particular claims involved are neither invalid for other reasons nor allowable under other provisions of the Social Security Act.
Section 405 (g) specifies the following requirements for judicial review: (1) a final decision of the Secretary made after a hearing; (2) commencement of a civil action within 60 days after the mailing of notice of such decision (or within such further time as the Secretary
In the present case, the complaint seeks review of the denial of benefits based on the plain wording of a statute which is alleged to be unconstitutional. That a denial on such grounds, which are beyond the power of the Secretary to affect, is nonetheless a decision of the Secretary for these purposes has been heretofore established. Flemming v. Nestor, 363 U.S. 603 (1960). As to class members, however, the complaint is deficient in that it contains no allegations that they have even filed an application with the Secretary, much less that he has rendered any decision, final or otherwise, review of which is sought. The class thus cannot satisfy the requirements for jurisdiction under 42 U. S. C. § 405 (g). Other sources of jurisdiction being foreclosed by § 405 (h), the District Court was without jurisdiction over so much of the complaint as concerns the class, and it should have entered an appropriate order of dismissal.
The jurisdictional issue with respect to the named appellees is somewhat more difficult. In a paragraph entitled "Exhaustion of Remedies," the complaint alleges that they fully presented their claims for benefits "to their district Social Security Office and, upon denial, to
We have previously recognized that the doctrine of administrative exhaustion should be applied with a regard for the particular administrative scheme at issue. Parisi v. Davidson, 405 U.S. 34 (1972); McKart v. United States, 395 U.S. 185 (1969). Exhaustion is generally required as a matter of preventing premature interference with agency processes, so that the agency may function efficiently and so that it may have an opportunity to correct its own errors, to afford the parties and the courts the benefit of its experience and expertise, and to compile a record which is adequate for judicial review. See, e. g., id., at 193-194. Plainly these purposes have been served once the Secretary has satisfied himself that the only issue is the constitutionality of a statutory requirement, a matter which is beyond his jurisdiction to determine, and that the claim is neither otherwise invalid nor cognizable under a different section of the Act. Once a benefit applicant has presented his or her claim at a sufficiently high level of review to satisfy the Secretary's administrative needs, further exhaustion would not merely be futile for the applicant.
The present case, of course, is significantly different from McKart in that a "final decision" is a statutorily specified jurisdictional prerequisite. The requirement is, therefore, as we have previously noted, something more than simply a codification of the judicially developed doctrine of exhaustion, and may not be dispensed with merely by a judicial conclusion of futility such as that made by the District Court here. But it is equally true that the requirement of a "final decision" contained in § 405 (g) is not precisely analogous to the more classical jurisdictional requirements contained in such sections of Title 28 as 1331 and 1332. The term "final decision" is not only left undefined by the Act, but its meaning is left to the Secretary to flesh out by regulation.
Much the same may be said about the statutory requirement that the Secretary's decision be made "after a hearing." Not only would a hearing be futile and wasteful, once the Secretary has determined that the only issue to be resolved is a matter of constitutional law concededly beyond his competence to decide, but the Secretary may, of course, award benefits without requiring a hearing. We do not understand the statute to prevent him from similarly determining in favor of the applicant, without a hearing, all issues with regard to eligibility save for one as to which he considers a hearing to be useless.
In the present case the Secretary does not raise any challenge to the sufficiency of the allegations of exhaustion in appellees' complaint. We interpret this to be a determination by him that for the purposes of this litigation the reconsideration determination is "final." The named appellees thus satisfy the requirements for § 405 (g) judicial review, and we proceed to the merits of their claim.
III
The District Court relied on congressional history for the proposition that the duration-of-relationship requirement was intended to prevent the use of sham marriages to secure Social Security payments. As such, concluded the court, "the requirement constitutes a presumption that marriages like Mrs. Salfi's, which did not precede
Our ultimate conclusion is that the District Court was wrong in holding the duration-of-relationship requirement unconstitutional. Because we are aware that our various holdings in related cases do not all sound precisely the same note, we will explain ourselves at some length.
The standard for testing the validity of Congress' Social Security classification was clearly stated in Flemming v. Nestor, 363 U. S., at 611:
In Richardson v. Belcher, 404 U.S. 78 (1971), a portion of the Social Security Act which required an otherwise entitled disability claimant to be subjected to an "offset" by reason of his simultaneous receipt of state workmen's compensation benefits was attacked as being violative of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The claimant in that case asserted that the provision was arbitrary in that it required offsetting of a
Two Terms earlier the Court had decided the case of Dandridge v. Williams, 397 U.S. 471 (1970), in which it rejected a claim that Maryland welfare legislation violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court had said:
The relation between the equal protection analysis of Dandridge and the Fifth Amendment due process analysis of Flemming v. Nestor and Richardson v. Belcher was described in the latter case in this language:
These cases quite plainly lay down the governing principle for disposing of constitutional challenges to classifications in this type of social welfare legislation. The District Court, however, chose to rely on Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, supra; Vlandis v. Kline, supra; and Stanley v. Illinois, supra. It characterized this recent group of cases as dealing with "the appropriateness
Stanley v. Illinois held that it was a denial of the equal protection guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment for a State to deny a hearing on parental fitness to an unwed father when such a hearing was granted to all other parents whose custody of their children was challenged. This Court referred to the fact that the "rights to conceive and to raise one's children have been deemed `essential,' Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 399 (1923), `basic civil rights of man,' Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541 (1942), and `[r]ights far more precious . . . than property rights,' May v. Anderson, 345 U.S. 528, 533 (1953)." 405 U. S., at 651.
In Vlandis v. Kline, a statutory definition of "residents" for purposes of fixing tuition to be paid by students in a state university system was held invalid. The Court held that where Connecticut purported to be concerned with residency, it might not at the same time deny to one seeking to meet its test of residency the opportunity to show factors clearly bearing on that issue. 412 U. S., at 452.
In LaFleur the Court held invalid, on the authority of Stanley and Vlandis, school board regulations requiring pregnant school teachers to take unpaid maternity leave commencing four to five months before the expected birth. The Court stated its longstanding recognition "that freedom of personal choice in matters of marriage and family life is one of the liberties protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment," 414 U. S., at 639-640, and that "overly restrictive maternity leave regulations can constitute a heavy burden on the exercise of these protected freedoms." Id., at 640.
We hold that these cases are not controlling on the issue before us now. Unlike the claims involved in
We think that the District Court's extension of the holdings of Stanley, Vlandis, and LaFleur to the eligibility requirement in issue here would turn the doctrine of those cases into a virtual engine of destruction for countless legislative judgments which have heretofore been thought wholly consistent with the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution. For example, the very
In Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U.S. 483 (1955), the Court dealt with a claim that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was violated by an Oklahoma statute which subjected opticians to a system of detailed regulation, but which exempted sellers of ready-to-wear glasses. In sustaining the statute the Court said:
If the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments permit this latitude to legislative decisions regulating the private sector of the economy, they surely allow no less latitude in prescribing the conditions upon which funds shall be dispensed from the public treasury. Dandridge v. Williams, supra. With these principles in mind, we turn to consider the statutory provisions which the District Court held invalid.
Title 42 U. S. C. § 402 (1970 ed. and Supp. III) is the basic congressional enactment defining eligibility for oldage and survivors insurance benefit payments, and is divided into 23 lettered subsections. Subsection (g) is entitled "Mother's insurance benefits," and primarily governs the claim of appellee Salfi. Subsection (d) governs eligibility for child's insurance benefits, and is the provision
A different insurance system, but similarly defined by statute and operated by a governmental entity, was the subject of our consideration in Geduldig v. Aiello, 417 U.S. 484 (1974), and our disposition of that case is instructive. We reversed the judgment of a District Court which had held that a California state disability insurance program was invalid insofar as it failed to provide benefits for disabilities associated with normal pregnancy. In our opinion we said:
The present case is somewhat different, since the Secretary principally defends the duration-of-relationship requirement, not as a reasonable legislative decision to exclude a particular type of risk from coverage, but instead as a method of assuring that payments are made only upon the occurrence of events the risk of which is covered by the insurance program.
Under those standards, the question raised is not whether a statutory provision precisely filters out those, and only those, who are in the factual position which generated the congressional concern reflected in the statute. Such a rule would ban all prophylactic provisions, and would be directly contrary to our holding in Mourning, supra. Nor is the question whether the provision filters out a substantial part of the class which caused congressional concern, or whether it filters out more members of the class than nonmembers. The question is whether Congress, its concern having been reasonably aroused by the possibility of an abuse which it legitimately desired to avoid, could rationally have concluded both that a particular limitation or qualification would protect against its occurrence, and that the expense and other difficulties of individual determinations justified the inherent imprecision of a prophylactic rule. We conclude that the duration-of-relationship test meets this constitutional standard.
The danger of persons entering a marriage relationship not to enjoy its traditional benefits, but instead to enable one spouse to claim benefits upon the anticipated early death of the wage earner, has been recognized from the very beginning of the Social Security program. While no early legislative history addresses itself specifically to the duration-of-relationship requirement for mother's and child's benefits, there were discussions of the analogous requirement for receipt of wife's benefits under § 402 (b). See 42 U. S. C. § 416 (b) (1970 ed., Supp. IV), defining "wife." Dr. A. J. Altmeyer, Chairman of the Social Security Board, noted that a five-year requirement "should be strict enough to prevent marriage in anticipation
The Advisory Council also stated, with regard to § 402 (e) widow's benefits which, like mother's benefits, depend on the § 416 (c) definition of "widow":
Similar concerns were reflected in the House and Senate Reports on the 1946 amendment which reduced to three years the required duration of a marriage for the purposes of an eligible "wife." It was stated:
Later amendments to the Act have been accompanied by discussions of the duration-of-relationship requirements contained in the definitions of "widow" and "child." Like the early history of analogous requirements, they reflect congressional concern with the possibility of relationships entered for the purpose of obtaining benefits. In 1967, when the durational period was reduced from one year to nine months, the House Report stated:
When in 1972 Congress added the provisions of 42 U. S. C. § 416 (k) (2) (1970 ed., Supp. III) (eliminating
Undoubtedly the concerns reflected in this congressional material are legitimate, involving as they do the integrity of both the Social Security Trust Fund and the marriage relationship. It is also undoubtedly true that the duration-of-relationship requirement operates to lessen the likelihood of abuse through sham relationships entered in contemplation of imminent death. We also think that Congress could rationally have concluded that any imprecision from which it might suffer was justified by its ease and certainty of operation.
We note initially that the requirement is effective only within a somewhat narrow range of situations lacking certain characteristics which might reasonably be thought to establish the genuineness of a marital relationship which involves children (and thus the potential for mother's and child's benefits). Even though a surviving wife has not been married for a period of nine months immediately prior to her husband's death, she is nonetheless within the definition of "widow" if she meets one of the other disjunctive requirements of § 416 (c). If she is the mother of her late husband's son or daughter; if she legally adopted his son or daughter while she was married to him and while such son or daughter was under the age of 18; if he legally adopted her son or daughter under the same circumstances; or if during their marriage, however short, they legally adopted a child under the age of 18—in any of these circumstances the surviving wife may claim widow's or mother's benefits
Even so, § 416 (c) (5) undoubtedly excludes some surviving wives who married with no anticipation of shortly becoming widows, and it may be that appellee Salfi is among them. It likewise may be true that the requirement does not filter out every such claimant, if a wage earner lingers longer than anticipated, or in the case of illnesses which can be recognized as terminal more than nine months prior to death. But neither of these facts necessarily renders the statutory scheme unconstitutional.
While it is possible to debate the wisdom of excluding legitimate claimants in order to discourage sham relationships, and of relying on a rule which may not exclude some obviously sham arrangements, we think it clear that Congress could rationally choose to adopt such a course. Large numbers of people are eligible for these programs and are potentially subject to inquiry as to the validity of their relationships to wage earners. These people include not only the classes which appellees represent,
The Constitution does not preclude such policy choices as a price for conducting programs for the distribution of social insurance benefits. Cf. Geduldig v. Aiello, 417 U. S., at 496. Unlike criminal prosecutions, or the custody proceedings at issue in Stanley v. Illinois, such programs do not involve affirmative Government action which seriously curtails important liberties cognizable under the Constitution. There is thus no basis for our requiring individualized determinations when Congress can rationally conclude not only that generalized rules are appropriate to its purposes and concerns, but also that the difficulties of individual determinations outweigh the marginal increments in the precise effectuation of congressional concern which they might be expected to produce.
The judgment of the District Court is
Reversed.
MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS, dissenting.
I agree with MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN that because there is clearly jurisdiction the Court's extended discussion of the subject is unwarranted.
On the merits, I believe that the main problem with these legislatively created presumptions is that they frequently invade the right to a jury trial. See Tot v. United States, 319 U.S. 463, 473 (1943) (Black, J., concurring). The present law was designed to bar payment of certain Social Security benefits when the purpose of the marriage was to obtain such benefits. Whether this was the aim of a particular marriage is a question of fact, to be decided by the jury in an appropriate case. I therefore would vacate and remand the case to give Mrs. Salfi the right to show that her
MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN, with whom MR. JUSTICE MARSHALL joins, dissenting.
The District Court did not err, in my view, either in holding that it had jurisdiction by virtue of 28 U. S. C. § 1331, or in holding that the nine-month requirements of 42 U. S. C. §§ 416 (c) (5) and (e) (2) (1970 ed. and Supp. III) are constitutionally invalid.
I
Jurisdiction
The jurisdictional issue to which the Court devotes 10 pages, only to conclude that there is indeed jurisdiction over the merits of this case both here and in the District Court, was not raised in this Court by the parties before us nor argued, except most peripherally,
Because the Court nonetheless treats the question fully, I am obliged to do so as well. For, at least insofar as my own research and consideration, unaided by the help ordinarily offered by adversary consideration, is adequate, I am convinced that the Court is quite wrong about the intended reach of § 405 (h), and that its construction attributes to Congress a purpose both contrary
A
The Court rejects the District Court's conclusion that § 405 (h) is no more than a codified requirement of administrative exhaustion on the basis of the third sentence of the section, which it characterizes as "sweeping and direct and [stating] that no action shall be brought under § 1331, not merely that only those actions shall be brought in which administrative remedies have been exhausted." Ante, at 757. But the sentence does not say that no action of any kind shall be brought under § 1331, or other general grants of jurisdiction, which may result in entitling someone to benefits under Title II of the Act; it says merely that no action shall be brought under § 1331 et seq. "to recover on any claim arising under [Title II]." (Emphasis added.) This action, I believe, does not "arise under" Title II in the manner intended by § 405 (h), and it is, at least in part, not an action to "recover" on a claim. See Parts B and C, infra.
Section 405 (h), I believe, only bans, except under § 405 (g), suits which arise under Title II in the sense that they require the application of the statute to a set of facts, and which seek nothing more than a determination of eligibility claimed to arise under the Act. Thus, I basically agree with the District Court that § 405 (h), including its last sentence, merely codifies the usual
The Court suggests that this reading of § 405 (h) makes the last sentence redundant. But this is the reading which the Social Security Board itself gave to the provision soon after it went into effect. In a document prepared for and approved by the Board in January 1940 as an outline of the procedures to be followed under the newly enacted Social Security Act Amendments of 1939,
Since the last sentence of § 405 (h) is the only part of the section which "specifically exclude[s]" any "action," the italicized portion obviously refers to that sentence.
Thus, the agency responsible for the enforcement of Title II adopted a construction of the statute which gave the last sentence the very meaning which the Court now rejects as "superfluous" and "already performed by other statutory provisions." Ante, at 757, 759, and n. 6. As explained in the margin,
Without any clear evidence, indeed without any
I think it quite clear that a claim "arising under" Title II is one which alleges that the Title grants someone certain rights. This claim does not "arise under" the Title because, if the statute itself were applied, Mrs. Salfi would certainly lose. Instead, this case "arises under" the Constitution and seeks to hold invalid the result which would be reached under the statute itself. Johnson v. Robison, supra, as well as cases construing the meaning of "arising under" in other jurisdictional statutes,
In Johnson, construing the language which appears ante, at 761, we said, 415 U. S., at 367:
The Court, ante, at 761-762, suggests that this interpretation turned on the precise wording of the statute construed in Johnson, specifically on the words "decisions. . . on any question of law and fact." First, as the quotation above shows, Johnson in fact concentrated not upon what constitutes a "decision" of the administrator
See Johnson, 415 U. S., at 368-369, n. 9. The italicized language is obviously quite similar to that used in § 405 (h). The Court's opinion in Johnson made clear that the holding that the section does not apply to constitutional attacks on veterans' benefits legislation encompasses all prior versions of the section, and that the "claim for benefits" language in no way affected this construction of the statute.
Aside from Johnson, our cases concerning the meaning of "arising under" in the jurisdictional statutes affirm that this claim arises under the Constitution and not under the Social Security Act. We have consistently held that a controversy regarding title to land does not "arise under" federal law "merely because one of the parties to it has derived his title under an act of Congress." Shulthis v. McDougal, 225 U.S. 561, 570 (1912). See Oneida Indian Nation v. County of Oneida,
Thus, "arising under" is a term of art in jurisdictional statutes referring, at least in part, to the body of law necessary to consider in order to determine the rights in question. Here, there is no dispute about the application of the Social Security Act; the only controversy concerns whether the Constitution permits the result which the Social Security Act would require. Therefore, this case does not concern a "claim arising under" Title II, and is not precluded by the last sentence of § 405 (h) from consideration under 28 U. S. C. § 1331.
C
Not only does this case not concern a "claim arising under" Title II, but it is, at least in part, not an "action. . . to recover on any claim." (Emphasis added.) A three-judge District Court dealt with the "recover on [a] claim" aspect of § 405 (h) in Gainville v. Richardson, 319 F.Supp. 16, 18 (Mass. 1970).
This holding seems eminently sensible to me. The legislative history and administrative interpretation of § 405 (h), supra, at 790-792, and n. 8, reveal no basis for supposing that the section was to apply to suits which did not request immediate payment of a claim as part of the relief. To construe the statute to cover all actions which may later, after administrative consideration, result in eligibility under Title II is to mutilate the statutory language.
The holding in Gainville, supra, applies squarely to this case. The complaint sought declaratory and injunctive relief with respect to both the named plaintiffs and the class, as well as retroactive benefits. App. 12-13. The injunction sought was either an order to provide benefits or "an opportunity for a hearing on the genuineness of their status, [for] plaintiffs and all those similarly situated." Id., at 13. Thus, even if § 405 (h) precludes granting retroactive benefits except under § 405 (g), it would not, under the rationale of Gainville, supra, preclude granting any declaratory and injunctive relief to the class, since the relief requested would not necessarily be tantamount to recovery on a claim. Indeed,
The Court concludes that there was jurisdiction over the claim for retroactive benefits for the named plaintiffs under § 405 (g). (But see Part D, infra.) Under the Gainville rationale, there would be jurisdiction under § 1331 over the claims for class declaratory and injunctive relief. And if there was jurisdiction under one jurisdictional statute or another for each part of the action, surely there was jurisdiction over the whole.
D
Finally, even if I could agree, and I do not, that § 405 (g) is the exclusive route for consideration of this kind of case, I would dissent from the Court's treatment of the exhaustion requirement of § 405 (g), ante, at 764-767.
If, as the Court holds, the finality and hearing requirements of § 405 (g) are not jurisdictional,
Moreover, and significantly, it flagrantly distorts the record in this case to say that the Secretary waived the exhaustion requirements of § 405 (g), recognizing their futility. True, the Secretary does not here claim a lack of jurisdiction for failure to exhaust on the individual claim, see n. 1, supra. But he did, in the District Court, move to dismiss the entire action for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. See Notice and Motion to Dismiss or for Summary Judgment, at Record 114-117. The Secretary said, referring to §§ 405 (g) and (h):
In the face of this statement, the Court's conclusion that the Secretary determined "that for the purposes of this litigation the reconsideration determination is `final,' " ante, at 767, is patently indefensible.
II
The merits of this case can be dealt with very briefly. For it is, I believe, apparent on the face of the Court's opinion that today's holding is flatly contrary to several recent decisions, specifically Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U.S. 441 (1973); U. S. Dept. of Agriculture v. Murry, 413 U.S. 508 (1973); and Jimenez v. Weinberger, 417 U.S. 628 (1974).
In Vlandis, we said, 412 U. S., at 446: "[P]ermanent irrebuttable presumptions have long been disfavored under the Due Process [Clause] of the . . . Fourteenth [Amendment]." The Court today distinguishes Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645 (1972), and Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur, 414 U.S. 632 (1974), two cases which struck down conclusive presumptions, because both dealt with protected rights, while this case deals with "a noncontractual claim to receive funds from the public treasury [which] enjoys no constitutionally protected status." Ante, at 772. But Vlandis also dealt with a Government benefit program—the provision of an
Yet, the Connecticut statute in Vlandis did not set "residency," undefined, as the criteria of eligibility; it defined residency in certain ways. The definitions of "resident" were precisely parallel to the statute here, which defines "widow" and "child" in part by the number of months of marriage, 42 U. S. C. §§ 416 (c) and (e) (1970 ed. and Supp. III).
Similarly, Murry, supra, and Jimenez, supra, both dealt with conclusive presumptions contained in statutes setting out criteria for eligibility for Government benefits. The Court distinguishes them as cases in which the "criteria. . . bear no rational relation to a legitimate legislative goal." Ante, at 772. But if the presumptions in Murry and Jimenez were irrational, the presumption in this case is even more irrational. We have been presented with no evidence at all that the problem of collusive marriages is one which exists at all. Indeed, the very fact that Congress has continually moved back the amount of time required to avoid the irrebuttable presumption, ante, at 778-780, suggests that it found, for each time period set, that it was depriving deserving people of benefits without alleviating any real problem of collusion. There is no reason to believe that the nine-month period is any more likely to discard a high proportion of collusive marriages than the five-year, three-year, or one-year periods employed earlier.
The Court says: "The administrative difficulties of individual eligibility determinations are without doubt
This is not to say, nor has the Court ever held, that all statutory provisions based on assumptions about underlying facts are per se unconstitutional unless individual hearings are provided. But in this case, as in the others in which we have stricken down conclusive presumptions, it is possible to specify those factors which, if proved in a hearing, would disprove a rebuttable presumption. See, e. g., Vlandis, 412 U. S., at 452. For example, persuasive evidence of good health at the time of marriage would be sufficient, I should think, to disprove that the marriage was collusive. Also, in this case, as in Stanley, 405 U. S., at 655, and LaFleur, 414 U. S., at 643, the presumption, insofar as it precludes people as to whom the presumed fact is untrue from so proving, runs counter to the general legislative policy—here, providing true widows and children with survivors' benefits. And finally, the presumption here, like that in Vlandis, Murry, and Jimenez, involves a measure of social opprobrium; the assumption is that the individual has purposely undertaken to evade legitimate requirements. When these factors are present, I believe
I would affirm the judgment of the District Court.
FootNotes
"Question: . . . [I]s the United States satisfied there was jurisdiction in the district court here?
"Mrs. Shapiro: We are not satisfied that there was jurisdiction to the extent that it . . . identified a class and required retroactive payments to all members of the class." (Emphasis added.)
Thus, the appellants never claimed here that the District Court was without jurisdiction over the merits of this case, for they conceded, apparently, jurisdiction to grant declaratory and injunctive relief.
Bartley v. Finch, supra, was the only one of these cases holding that § 405 (g) is the exclusive means of determining the constitutionality of a provision of the Social Security Act, and that there was, because of noncompliance with § 405 (g), no jurisdiction. The District Court then went on to decide the merits. This Court's affirmance was explicitly on the merits, and thus must be taken to have held that there was jurisdiction even though § 405 (g) was not complied with.
Other courts have grappled with §§ 405 (g) and (h) in other contexts. See, e. g., Filice v. Celebrezze, 319 F.2d 443 (CA9 1963); compare Cappadora v. Celebrezze, 356 F.2d 1 (CA2 1966), with Stuckey v. Weinberger, 488 F.2d 904 (CA9 1973) (en banc). In Cappadora, supra, Judge Friendly, in considering the application of §§ 405 (g) and (h) to review of a decision not to reopen a claim of statutory qualification, cautioned against overly literal interpretation of the sections. 356 F. 2d, at 4-5.
The House of Representatives Report says of § 405 (g): "The provisions of this subsection are similar to those made for the review of decisions of many administrative bodies." H. R. Rep. No. 728, 76th Cong., 1st Sess., 43 (1939). The Report describes § 405 (h) basically in its own words. Id., at 43-44. There is no indication that the latter section was intended in any way to alter the intent indicated by the quoted sentence—to legislate only ordinary administrative exhaustion requirements.
Finally, a statement inserted by Mr. Mitchell, Commissioner of Social Security, into the record of the 1959 Hearings on the Administration of the Social Security Disability Insurance Program before the Subcommittee on the Administration of the Social Security Laws of the House Committee on Ways and Means, 86th Cong., 1st Sess., 977 (1960), again reflects the view that §§ 405 (g) and (h) together merely reiterate, even if a bit redundantly, that "the jurisdiction of a court to review a determination of the Secretary is limited to a review of the record made before the Secretary. This is made amply clear by the second and third sentences of § [405 (g)] and by the provisions of [§ 405 (h)]. . . . The court has no power to hold a hearing and determine the merits of the claim because the statute makes it clear that the determination of claims is solely a function of the Secretary."
As the Court points out, ante, at 759 n. 6, in most instances, see n. 6, supra, a person is not "eligible" for benefits until be files an application. Further, the order obviously contemplates administrative proceedings in order to determine whether "such persons are otherwise fully eligible." Finally, if exhaustion of § 405 (g) is indeed, as the Court holds, always a prerequisite to eligibility, then a person would not be "otherwise fully eligible" unless and until he exhausts § 405 (g). Thus, I believe that the order can be read not to mandate retroactive benefits but only to require that claims of the class members be treated as if the nine-month marriage requirement did not exist. Such an order does not constitute recovery on a claim and, in my view, was proper under 28 U. S. C. § 1331.
"(c) The term `widow' (except when used in section 402 (i) of this title) means the surviving wife of an individual, but only if (1) she is the mother of his son or daughter, (2) she legally adopted his son or daughter while she was married to him and while such son or daughter was under the age of eighteen, (3) he legally adopted her son or daughter while she was married to him and while such son or daughter was under the age of eighteen, (4) she was married to him at the time both of them legally adopted a child under the age of eighteen, (5) she was married to him for a period of not less than nine months immediately prior to the day on which he died, or (6) in the month prior to the month of her marriage to him (A) she was entitled to, or on application therefor and attainment of age 62 in such prior month would have been entitled to, benefits under subsection (b), (e), or (h) of section 402 of this title, (B) she had attained age eighteen and was entitled to, or on application therefor would have been entitled to, benefits under subsection (d) of such section (subject, however, to section 402 (s) of this title), or (C) she was entitled to, or upon application therefor and attainment of the required age (if any) would have been entitled to, a widow's, child's (after attainment of age 18), or parent's insurance annuity under section 231a of Title 45."
It is undisputed that appellee Salfi cannot qualify as a "widow" by satisfying condition (1), (2), (3), (4), or (6).
Title 42 U. S. C. § 416 (e) (1970 ed., Supp. III) provides in part:
"(e) Child.
"The term `child' means (1) the child or legally adopted child of an individual, (2) a stepchild who has been such stepchild for not less than one year immediately preceding the day on which application for child's insurance benefits is filed or (if the insured individual is deceased) not less than nine months immediately preceding the day on which such individual died . . . ."
Prior to 1967, the required duration of relationship was a full year. The reduction to nine months was accomplished in Pub. L. 90-248, §§ 156 (a) and (b), 81 Stat. 866.
"Finality of Secretary's decision.
"The findings and decisions of the Secretary after a hearing shall be binding upon all individuals who were parties to such hearing. No findings of fact or decision of the Secretary shall be reviewed by any person, tribunal, or governmental agency except as herein provided. No action against the United States, the Secretary, or any officer or employee thereof shall be brought under section 41 of Title 28 to recover on any claim arising under this subchapter."
"Judicial review.
"Any individual, after any final decision of the Secretary made after a hearing to which he was a party, irrespective of the amount in controversy, may obtain a review of such decision by a civil action commenced within sixty days after the mailing to him of notice of such decision or within such further time as the Secretary may allow. Such action shall be brought in the district court of the United States for the judicial district in which the plaintiff resides, or has his principal place of business, or, if he does not reside or have his principal place of business within any such judicial district, in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. As part of his answer the Secretary shall file a certified copy of the transcript of the record including the evidence upon which the findings and decision complained of are based. The court shall have power to enter, upon the pleadings and transcript of the record, a judgment affirming, modifying, or reversing the decision of the Secretary, with or without remanding the cause for a rehearing. The findings of the Secretary as to any fact, if supported by substantial evidence, shall be conclusive, and where a claim has been denied by the Secretary or a decision is rendered under subsection (b) of this section which is adverse to an individual who was a party to the hearing before the Secretary, because of failure of the claimant or such individual to submit proof in conformity with any regulation prescribed under subsection (a) of this section, the court shall review only the question of conformity with such regulations and the validity of such regulations. The court shall, on motion of the Secretary made before he files his answer, remand the case to the Secretary for further action by the Secretary, and may, at any time, on good cause shown, order additional evidence to be taken before the Secretary, and the Secretary shall, after the case is remanded, and after hearing such additional evidence if so ordered, modify or affirm his findings of fact or its decision, or both, and shall file with the court any such additional and modified findings of fact and decision, and a transcript of the additional record and testimony upon which his action in modifying or affirming was based. Such additional or modified findings of fact and decision shall be reviewable only to the extent provided for review of the original findings of fact and decision. The judgment of the court shall be final except that it shall be subject to review in the same manner as a judgment in other civil actions. Any action instituted in accordance with this subsection shall survive not-withstanding any change in the person occupying the office of Secretary or any vacancy in such office."
Our Brother BRENNAN relies heavily, post, at 790-792, on a passage from a Senate document entitled "Monograph of the Attorney General's Committee on Administrative Procedure." S. Doc. No. 10, 77th Cong., 1st Sess., pt. 3, p. 39 (1941). The basic monograph itself is described as "embodying the results of the investigations made by the staff of said committee relative to the [administrative] practices and procedures of" several agencies of the Government. Id., at II. Following the text of the monograph is the "Appendix," which in turn is described in a "Foreword" as follows: "This statement, developed from a report by the Bureau of Old-Age and Survivors Insurance making certain recommendations for the Board's consideration, describes the essential features of a hearing and review system which has been authorized by the Board and which is designed to meet both the statutory requirements and the social purposes of the old-age and survivors insurance program. It has been developed during several months under the leadership of Ralph F. Fuchs, professor of law, Washington University, St. Louis, Mo., a consultant of this Bureau, by whom the Bureau's report, in the main, was written." Id., at 34. After the "Foreword" follows a three-part report in somewhat smaller type, the second of which parts is entitled "Considerations Affecting the Hearing and Review System." Within this second part, appears the language which MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN's dissent characterizes as "the reading which the Social Security Board itself gave to the provision soon after it went into effect." Post, at 790.
We have some doubts that the report of a consultant can be properly characterized as incorporating the "reading which the Social Security Board itself gave" to this provision. Even if the report as a whole is stated to have been "approved" by the Board, there is no indication that such approval extends beyond the report's broad-brush conceptualization of "the essential features of a hearing and review system." In any event, we do not agree that an administrative agency's general discussion of a statute, occurring after its passage, and in a context which does not require it to focus closely on the operative impact of a particular provision, is either an important indicator of congressional intent, as the dissent suggests, post, at 792, or an authoritative source for the proposition that a provision serves a particular function. Finally, even if the report is an accurate reading of the Act, its significance goes only to whether the third sentence of § 405 (h) serves a function in addition to that which we believe it serves; the possibility that the District Court's interpretation renders the third sentence only largely superfluous rather than totally so is not sufficient to disturb our analysis of the role of that sentence in this case.
"The Secretary shall have full power and authority to make rules and regulations and to establish procedures, not inconsistent with the provisions of this subchapter, which are necessary or appropriate to carry out such provisions, and shall adopt reasonable and proper rules and regulations to regulate and provide for the nature and extent of the proofs and evidence and the method of taking and furnishing the same in order to establish the right to benefits hereunder."
For example, all evidence of "knowledge of terminal illness" would ordinarily be under the control of applicants, which suggests that they should bear the burden of proof. But this burden could be convincingly carried only with respect to wage earners who happened to have had physical examinations shortly before their weddings; on the other hand, awarding benefits where the wage earner had not had an examination, and no medical evidence was available, would encourage participants in sham arrangements to conceal their own adverse medical evidence. Even when adequate medical evidence was available there could easily be difficulties in determining whether a wage earner's physical condition amounted to a "terminal illness"; if that concept were restricted to conditions which were virtually certain to result in an early death, benefits would probably be too broadly available, since certainty of imminent death rather than a mere high probability of it is not a prerequisite to a sham relationship; yet inquiries into the degree of likelihood of death could become very complex indeed.
Additional problems with appellees' proposed test arise because it, like the duration-of-relationship requirement, is not precisely related to the objective of denying benefits which are sought on the basis of sham relationships. In the first place, it presumably would be necessary to limit the requirement of terminal illness inquiries to instances in which death occurred within a specified period after marriage. It would also appear to be necessary to set an outside limit on the length of the period within which death was expected that would disqualify applicants (after all, and paraphrasing Lord Keynes, in the long run we are all expected to die). Yet there will always be persons on one side of such lines who are seriously disadvantaged vis-à-vis persons on the other side. More basically, appellees' test would clearly exclude persons who knew of a wage earner's imminent death, but who entered their marriages for reasons entirely unrelated to Social Security benefits, such as to fulfill the promises of a longstanding engagement. Thus appellees' proposed test would be subject to exactly the same constitutional attacks which they direct toward the test on which Congress chose to rely.
Appellees point out that 42 U. S. C. § 416 (k) (1970 ed., Supp. III) provides for limited exceptions to the duration-of-relationship requirement, unless the Secretary determines that at the time of the marriage the wage earner "could not have reasonably been expected to live for nine months." They argue that this represents Congress' recognition that case-by-case consideration would not impose an inordinate administrative burden. The argument is without merit. Section 416 (k) expresses Congress' willingness to accept case-by-case inquiries with regard to limited classes which bear particular indices of genuineness (the section is applicable in cases of accidental death, death in the line of military duty, and remarriages of persons previously married for more than nine months). This says nothing about the feasibility of making such inquiries in other circumstances, much less the rationality of choosing not to do so.
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