et al. Heckler v. Mathews

During 1977, the docket of the U.S. Supreme Court contained one case for review which attracted the concern and attention of all three branches of government--judicial, legislative, and executive. By agreeing to hear arguments in Califano v. Goldfarb (1977), the Court decided the constitutionality of gender-based distinctions which governed awarding of Social Security benefits to spouses concurrently drawing government pensions. In considering Goldfarb's claim, a widower who had been denied benefits to which widows were entitled, the Court found that the provisions of the Social Security Act imposed a gender-based distinction which unfairly burdened "a widower but not a widow with the task of proving dependency upon the deceased spouse." Specifically, men were required to prove that at least half their support derived from their spouses' income at the time of death while women who survived their spouses were entitled to benefits regardless of how much support derived from their deceased spouse. Thus, the Court affirmed the decision of a lower, U.S. district court "that the different treatment of men and women mandated by 402 (f) (1) (D) (a provision of the Social Security Act) constituted invidious discrimination against female wage earners by affording them less protection for their surviving spouses than is provided to male employees." Throughout 1977, the Court also reiterated the Goldfarb decision with two follow up cases, Califano v. Silbowitz (1977) and Jablon v. Califano (1977).

Before the calendar year elapsed, Congress responded with almost unprecedented unanimity and swiftness by amending Social Security legislation. Because of the Court's Goldfarb decision, men would receive previously unawarded benefits and also collect them retroactively. Fearing that the system would become overloaded and possibly go bankrupt, Congress authored and passed a revised statute which changed the eligibility criteria by which all beneficiaries were awarded spousal benefits. SSR 79-26 under Title II (Increase in Delayed Retirement Credit, and Delayed Retirement Credit for Widows or Widowers) stipulated that benefits for all spouses, regardless of gender, would be reduced according to a formula that was based on how much money a retiree received from federal or state pensions. However, legislators understood that many future retirees had made financial plans based on the way the Social Security Act had been written before being amended in 1977. Thus, so that change of law would not adversely impact people facing impending retirement, provisions of the 1977 amendment allowed for a five-year exemption period for spouses who, prior to 1982, would become eligible to receive spousal benefits. To ensure their intention to keep the Social Security fund from being depleted, Congress also passed a severability clause which stipulated that if any part of SSR 79-26 was declared unconstitutional, that the pension-offset clause would still remain in effect as the new law of the land.