Caring for Mom and Dad: Parent Dependency and American Social Policy [New ed.] 1009203282, 9781009203289

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Caring for Mom and Dad

Throughout the twentieth century, the United States implemented social policies targeting the needs of dependent parents – parents who were no longer able to work but lacked sufficient financial resources to support themselves. These parent dependency policies either encouraged or required family members, particularly adult children, to provide support as an alternative to government benefits. Debates over how best to support aging parents centered on conceptualizations of dependency and the moral obligations the family owed their parents. Measures of dependency often inhibited aging Americans’ access to benefits they needed, focusing instead on ensuring that they were, in fact, dependent and that other family resources were not available. Susan Stein-Roggenbuck highlights this understudied aspect of the modern US welfare state, highlighting the limited support provided to aging parents and the hardship they and their adult children endured in the efforts to minimize public expenditures. Susan Stein-Roggenbuck is an associate professor of writing and American social policy in James Madison College at Michigan State University. She is the author of Negotiating Relief: The Development of Social Welfare Programs in Depression-Era Michigan, 1930–1940.

Caring for Mom and Dad Parent Dependency and American Social Policy

SUSAN STEIN-ROGGENBUCK Michigan State University

Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge cb2 8ea, United Kingdom One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, ny 10006, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, vic 3207, Australia 314–321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre, New Delhi – 110025, India 103 Penang Road, #05–06/07, Visioncrest Commercial, Singapore 238467 Cambridge University Press is part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a department of the University of Cambridge. We share the University’s mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781009203289 doi: 10.1017/9781009203272 © Susan Stein-Roggenbuck 2024 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press & Assessment. First published 2024 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library. A Cataloging-in-Publication data record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. isbn 978-1-009-20328-9 Hardback Cambridge University Press & Assessment has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

For Mom

Contents

List of Maps

page viii

Acknowledgments List of Abbreviations

ix xii

Introduction

1

1 Resisting a Right to Relief: States, Responsible Relative Laws, and Old Age Assistance 2 “This Responsible Relative Racket”: Contesting Family Support Obligations 3 Aging Parents and Survivor Benefits: The Challenge of Proving Dependency 4 Taxing Rewards: Parent Dependency and American Tax Policy Conclusion

28 77 120 156 189

Bibliography Index

205 220

vii

Maps

1.1 Support laws by state in 1954 1.2 Recovery and responsible relative laws by state in 1954 C.1 Responsible relative laws by state in 2021

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page 34 74 197

Acknowledgments

Parental care was more an abstraction when I started researching parent dependency policies. At that time, my parents were retired and living in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Mom was a cancer survivor and she and Dad were healthy otherwise. They enjoyed cross-country skiing and snowmobiling, and spent their summers sailing the northern Great Lakes. As I worked on this project, Mom’s cancer returned and we lost her in 2017. This project became less abstract as my own parents aged and we cared for Mom in her final illness, and then for Dad as he created a new life alone after 56 years of marriage. Conversations with friends and colleagues revealed so many stories of aging parents. They shared their experiences in caring for parents, from helping with errands, medical appointments, and household tasks to paying for medical care or mortgages. Many provided significant support for parents, and some balanced caring for aging parents with raising their own children. I began to see how many people were quietly helping parents navigate their later years. The stories I encountered in this research recounted challenges similar to my friends and colleagues – adult children seeking to help parents in a social policy system that only recognized elder care when it suited the needs of the administrative state. Many people helped move this project from an idea to a book. No historian can work without the knowledge and assistance of librarians and archivists. From my first trip to the National Archives at College Park, Maryland, Tab Lewis helped me navigate the records of the Social Security Administration and other collections. Archivists at the California State Archives in Sacramento, the Archives of Michigan in Lansing, the National Archives in Washington, DC, and the Indiana ix

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State Archives helped me find the sources that illuminated the story I was trying to tell. Many librarians were also critical, including state library staff in California, Indiana, Missouri, North Dakota, and South Dakota. Their generosity of spirit is most appreciated. The Interlibrary Loan department at the Michigan State University Library fielded countless requests from me. Kasey Wilson in the MSU Map Library created the maps for this project, as he has for earlier research projects. I thank him for his expertise and good humor. James Madison College has been my professional home since 2003, and colleagues and students contributed to its completion. Research funding made travel to archives and libraries possible. Student research assistants Christie Teske Mayer and Lucas Hesskamp were diligent in their efforts to track down state public assistance laws – among other tasks – in the early stages of research. Colleagues Gene Burns, Mark Largent, and Jen Sykes read early drafts of what would become this manuscript. Kirstin Hasler Brathwaite is a valued friend and colleague who has shared many conversations about this project and our research. She and my friend Judy Hill were critical contacts for Dad when my family traveled. Jeff Judge was a model of how to care for an aging parent – his mom – with generosity, kindness, and love. I also thank Lanie Millar and Tom Grano, whose conversations, support, and advice over the past eight years were so important to this project’s completion. I thank all who shared their experiences with aging parents. Reviewers from the Journal of Policy History and the Social Service Review helped develop my analysis in early versions of this work. I thank the Journal of Policy History for permission to use parts of my article in the book: “Resisting a Right to Relief: States, Responsible Relative Laws, and Old Age Assistance.” Journal of Policy History, 30 (3), 400–428. © Donald Critchlow and Cambridge University Press 2018; https://doi.org /10.1017/S0898030618000155. I thank the Social Service Review for permission to use parts of my article in the book: “‘This Responsible Relative Racket’: The Persistence of Family Support Obligations in California.” Social Service Review. 91.4 (December 2017): 652–690. Social Service Review (December 2017). © 2017 by the University of Chicago. All rights reserved. https://doi-org.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/10.1086/ 695478. Audiences, panelists, and discussants at numerous Social Science History conferences shared ideas and insights. I thank the anonymous reviewers of Cambridge University Press, whose constructive but encouraging comments were invaluable. They helped me improve the manuscript immeasurably. Editor Cecelia Cancellaro was interested in

Acknowledgments

xi

the project from our first email exchange and encouraged me throughout the process. I would not be writing this without the unfailing support of family. My niece, Katerina Crowley, is my fellow writer in the family, and we share frustrations and successes. One of the hardest parts of the first year of COVID-19 was not seeing her. I thank her for all the video and phone conversations, texts, and emails. She enriches our lives beyond measure. Frank and Jacob deserve the most thanks. Frank is my best friend and partner, and there is no one else with whom I want to share this journey of life. Frank covered the home front when I traveled and encouraged me through the research and writing. His quiet confidence in the project’s value and completion was so appreciated. He is an important partner in our care for Dad. Frank and Jacob are the center of my life and words cannot capture the gratitude and love I have for them. Without them, none of this would have any meaning. I dedicate this book to my mom, Lois Stein, whose generosity of spirit was unmatched, and whose infectious laughter and smile brightened any space. We miss her terribly. I wish she was still here to care for.

Abbreviations

AB – Aid to the Blind ADC – Aid to Dependent Children AFDC – Aid to Families with Dependent Children BPA – Bureau of Public Assistance CCB – California Council for the Blind CCOAP – Citizens Committee on Old Age Pensions CTA – California Taxpayers’ Association DPW – Department of Public Welfare DSW – Department of Social Welfare FERA – Federal Emergency Relief Administration IRS – Internal Revenue Service NFB – National Federation for the Blind NWRO – National Welfare Rights Organization OAA – Old Age Assistance OAI – Old Age Insurance OAS – Old Age Security OASI – Old Age and Survivors Insurance OASDI – Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance SSA – Social Security Administration SSB – Social Security Board SSI – Supplemental Security Income WPA – Works Progress Administration

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Much of contemporary discourse surrounding family support obligations has long centered on parents’ financial contributions to their minor children. “Deadbeat Dads” who failed to meet parental support obligations, and whose children required public assistance, were central targets in the 1996 welfare reforms, the culmination of years of policies directed at nonsupporting parents. Largely absent in these debates was the responsibility of other family members – adult children, grandparents, siblings, and grandchildren – to support family members in need. Known as responsible relative or filial responsibility laws, such requirements have a long history in American social policy dating to colonial America. In 2016, twentynine states still had laws requiring adult children to support needy parents, although enforcement of such obligations had waned a generation earlier.1 In the face of rising health-care costs, third-party providers, such as nursing homes, are using laws requiring relative support to recover unpaid bills. In 2017, Elnora Thomas of Florida and her sister were sued by her mother’s nursing home for unpaid bills totaling $50,000. The suit threatened to place a lien on Thomas’ home, her only major asset. Attorneys helped her mother qualify for Medicaid to pay for the nursing home, and the suit was dropped.2 Two years later, fifty lawsuits were filed by longterm care facilities in Pennsylvania seeking payment from adult children Sylvia Macon, “Grow Up Virginia: Time to Change Our Filial Responsibility Law.” University of Richmond Law Review. 51.1 (2016): 265. 2 Beth Baker, “Paying for Mom: Little-Known Laws Force Families to Fund Parents’ Care.” AARP Bulletin Today. January 10, 2009. Electronic. 1

1

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for parents’ medical bills. John Pittas was the target of one such lawsuit. In 2007, Pittas’ mother was seriously injured in a car accident and received nursing home care for six months while she recovered. When able, she returned to Greece, and the nursing home sued her son for the $92,000 she owed for care. The Pennsylvania Superior Court ruled in 2012 that, under the state’s filial responsibility laws, Pittas was legally responsible for the unpaid balance. He had an annual net income of $85,000, according to the court decision.3 Three siblings in North Dakota were sued by their father’s nursing home for $45,000 in unpaid bills after his death. Their experience prompted the North Dakota legislature to pass a law changing the filial responsibility law to prevent such cases.4 Pennsylvania, South Dakota, and California are among the states turning to filial responsible laws to address the high medical costs the elderly often face in their later years. Escalating costs of nursing home care are prompting providers to use the laws to enforce the legal obligation of adult children to contribute to their parents’ medical care. The Pennsylvania legislature revitalized its law in 2005 to enable nursing homes to sue family members for unpaid bills under filial responsibility statutes.5 One legal scholar calls these laws “America’s best kept secret,” and some argue that enforcing such responsibility will lessen the burden of medical costs on Medicaid and encourage individuals to better plan for health-care costs with long-term care insurance.6 Demographic changes are fueling the problem of rising health-care costs for older Americans – and who will pay for that care. Elderly

W. Wade Scott and Erica L. Sharp, “The Wolf at the Door: Filial Responsibility under Delaware Law.” Widener Law Review. 20 (2014): 244–245; Health Care & Ret. Corp of Am. v. Pittas, 46A.3d 719, May 7, 2012 (Supreme Court, Pennsylvania). 4 Blair Emerson, “Little-Known Law Allows Nursing Homes to Sue Adult Children for Unpaid Bills.” Bismarck Tribune. July 28, 2018, Electronic; Blair Emerson, “Bill to Amend North Dakota’s Filial Statue Sent to Burgum.” Grand Forks Herald. March 14, 2019, Electronic; Jerilyn Klein Bier, “Parents’ Long-Term Care Remains a Potential Liability for Children.” Financial Advisor. March 26, 2019, Electronic. www.fa-mag.com/news/parentslong-term-care-remains-a-potential-liability-for-children-43986.html 5 Katherine C. Pearson, “Re-Thinking Filial Support Laws in a Time of Medicaid Cutbacks: Effect of Pennsylvania’s Recodification of Colonial-Era Poor Laws,” Pennsylvania Bar Association Quarterly. 76 (2005): 162, 166. 6 Ann Britton. “America’s Best Kept Secret: An Adult Child’s Duty to Support Aged Parents.” Western Law Review. 26 (1989–1990): 351; Matthew Pakula, “A Federal Filial Responsibility Statute: A Uniform Tool to Help Combat the Wave of Indigent Elderly,” Family Law Quarterly. 39.3 (2005–2006): 859–877; Allison E. Ross, “Taking Care of Our Caretakers: Using Filial Responsibility Laws to Support the Elderly beyond the Government’s Assistance,” Elder Law Journal. 16 (2008): 167–209. 3

Introduction

3

Americans’ share of the nation’s population increased from 35 million in 2000 to 52 million in 2018. Senior citizens – those aged sixty-five or older – were 12.4 percent of the nation’s population in 2000, rising to 16 percent in 2020.7 Health-care spending continues to increase, accounting for 19.7 percent of the Gross Domestic Product in 2020 at $4.1 trillion. Medicare spending that year totaled $829.5 billion, 20 percent of all health-care expenditures. Medicaid spending, up 9.2 percent, totaled $671.2 billion, 16 percent of total health-care expenditures. Prescription drug costs were $384.4 billion. Spending for Medicare and Medicaid accounts for 36 percent of the nation’s health-care costs, and the aged are central to both programs.8 A growing elderly population indicates that these trends will continue. Social security, including Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI), are critical sources of income for aged Americans, and scholars agree that these programs have provided some measure of economic security and reduced poverty among the aged.9 Poverty rates among senior citizens were 35.2 percent in 1959, higher than the rates for both children (27.3 percent) and adults younger than sixty-five (17 percent). In 2021, 5.8 million senior citizens (10.3 percent) lived in poverty using the official poverty measure, while 6 million (10.7 percent) were categorized in poverty under the supplemental poverty measure, which includes consideration of both cash and noncash government benefits.10 Incomes remain low for many senior citizens: nearly 15 million Americans over sixty-five (30.4 percent) lived on incomes less than 200 percent of the official poverty measure in 2016. Poverty rates among the elderly were even higher for women and people of color; under the supplemental poverty measure 16.2 percent of women versus 12.5 percent of men and nearly a quarter of all people of color over sixty-five compared to about 10 percent of all elderly white adults lived in US Census Bureau, “2020 Census Will Help Policymakers Prepare for the Incoming Wave of Aging Boomers.” December 10, 2019. US Census. www.census.gov/library/stories/20 19/12/by-2030-all-baby-boomers-will-be-age-65-or-older.html 8 “NHE Fact Sheet.” Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. August 9, 2018. www .cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Statistics-Trends-and-Reports/National HealthExpendData/NHE-Fact-Sheet 9 John Iceland, Poverty in America: A Handbook, 3rd ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013): 40–41; Michael B. Katz, The Price of Citizenship: Redefining the American Welfare State (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011): 12. 10 Creamer, John, Emily A. Shrider, Kalee Burns, and Frances Chen. “Poverty in the United States: 2021.” US Census. Table A-1 and Table B-3. www.census.gov/library/publica tions/2022/demo/p60-277.html 7

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poverty.11 These statistics all point to gaps in financial resources for aging Americans. The questions raised include where additional resources for aging Americans might be found, and who should shoulder the responsibility to ensure that older Americans have the economic security they need. Historically parent dependency policies were one answer to these questions. Parent dependency policies date to the colonial era and expanded across the policy spectrum in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. These policies sought either to require or encourage the support of aging parents by adult children; they were designed to alleviate poverty among the aged while minimizing dependence on public funds. I define dependent parents as aged Americans who had too few financial resources to meet their needs and thus relied not only on public benefits but also on the willingness of family, often adult children, to contribute to their support. Adult children were defined as individuals over the age of eighteen who had the financial means to provide support. Parent dependency policies, as I term them, prioritized support by family members via responsible relative laws before needy parents turned to public assistance; by the midtwentieth century, the scope of these policies expanded to include survivor benefits and federal tax incentives. Parent dependency policies transcended the different tracks of the American welfare state – means-tested, contributory, and tax expenditures – and at times included features of both means-tested and contributory programs. This book analyzes the history of parent dependency policies across the spectrum of American social policy throughout the twentieth century, particularly after the Social Security Act of 1935: responsible relative laws in Old Age Assistance (OAA); survivor benefits in the Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) program and the US military provided to parents as a result of adult children’s payroll contributions or military service; and federal tax expenditures available to adult children providing a specific level of support to aging parents. Parent dependency policies varied in their definition of dependency and how dependency was measured. The programs available to the elderly were shaped by race, gender, and citizenship, replicating exclusions found in these programs more

11

The official poverty measure for people over 65 was $11,511 in 2016 and $13,590 in 2022. The Supplemental Poverty Measure considers expenditures and resources, as well as differences due to cost of living. “How Many Seniors Are Living in Poverty?” Henry K. Kaiser Family Foundation. March 2, 2018.

Introduction

5

widely. I argue that consideration of parent dependency policies prompts a reevaluation of the effects the Social Security Act’s provisions on family obligations and the relationship of the family to state and federal governments. Instead of entirely replacing family support, some policies either required or encouraged family members to provide support. Measures of dependency often inhibited aging Americans’ access to benefits they sorely needed, focusing instead on ensuring that they were, in fact, dependent and that other family resources were not available.

parent dependency policies Parent dependency policies are found in numerous areas of America’s “divided welfare state” or what Jacob Hacker terms “America’s unique ‘welfare regime’.”12 My focus is on public benefits, or those available via government-enacted programs, rather than benefits earned from private employment. This book addresses those parents who did not have private retirement benefits earned through employment or a family member’s employment, or did not have enough to provide for their needs or their spouses’ needs as they aged. The range of programs and services for aged Americans with financial need is significant, and some – such as Meals on Wheels – reduce the burden on other family members. An analysis of all programs serving the aged with financial need is beyond the scope of this study. This book analyzes three parent dependency policies through the lens of adult children’s responsibility to support. The book also considers the families of aging parents, particularly their adult children, who helped to fill those financial gaps, either voluntarily or involuntarily. Hearing the voices of those who needed the aid, those who sought to provide it or faced intense scrutiny in the determination of potential support, or who advocated for more generous public benefits is a key goal of this project. The relationship between OAA and OASI under the Social Security Act of 1935 is critical in the analysis of parent dependency; the two programs developed in tandem and the expansion of OASI directly affected the numbers of elderly receiving OAA.13 The 1935 Social Security Act – and 12

Hacker’s argument focuses on the mix of public and private benefits that comprise America’s welfare state, but his concept also applies to parent dependency policies as they transcend the different tracks of the nation’s public welfare state. Jacob S. Hacker, The Divided Welfare State: The Battle over Public and Private Social Benefits in the United States (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005): 7. 13 Old Age Insurance was created under the original 1935 Social Security Act, and is the program commonly referred to as social security today. The 1939 amendments expanded

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its subsequent amendments – is fundamental to discussions of economic assistance and security (or insecurity) for older Americans. OASI and OAA were intended to address economic security for the elderly via both social insurance and public assistance. The Social Security Act reinforced the two-track system of benefits in America’s federal welfare policy – contributory in OASI and means-tested in the public assistance programs (OAA, Aid to the Blind and Aid to Dependent Children). OASI was a contributory program funded in part by payroll taxes from both employees and employers; the goal was to provide retired workers, at the age of sixty-five, with a monthly benefit based on their earnings and contributions. Under the 1939 amendments, widows, children, and dependent parents were eligible for survivor benefits based on the earnings of the deceased worker, and the program was renamed OASI.14 OAA, funded by general tax revenues, targeted Americans over sixty-five who were ineligible for OASI, or whose OASI benefits and other income were insufficient for their basic needs.15 Taxation links all three policies but funds the policies via different tax mechanisms. Architects of the Social Security Act framed OASI as a contributory program – a type of insurance premium that would be funded by contributions from workers, in contrast to OAA which had no dedicated tax revenue. The long-term goal, several scholars argue, was to expand OASI to more workers and to make public assistance unnecessary. Molly Michelmore argues that OASI was positioned in contrast to public assistance in its design and cost, in part to address taxpayer resistance to the program: “The [Roosevelt] administration’s reliance on the payroll tax to finance its most significant welfare policy initiatives – and its commitment to the annuity fiction – successfully muted taxpayer resistance to these programs and to the dollars used to fund them by benefits to include survivors, and the name changed to Old Age Survivor Insurance. I will use OASI unless specifically referencing the earlier program (OAI) or the later program: Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI). 14 Katz, The Price of Citizenship, 236–237; Alice Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity: Women, Men and the Quest for Economic Citizenship in 20th-Century America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001): 126–128; Edward Berkowitz, America’s Welfare State: From Roosevelt to Reagan (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991): 20–28; Hacker, The Divided Welfare State, 108–111; and W. Andrew Achenbaum, Social Security: Visions and Revisions (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986): 21–22. 15 Katz, The Price of Citizenship, 234–235; Ira Katznelson, When Affirmative Action Was White: An Untold History of Racial Inequality in Twentieth-Century America (New York: W. W. Norton, 2005): 46–47; Jill Quadagno, The Color of Welfare (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994): 19–21.

Introduction

7

distinguishing between social insurances premiums and the taxes that financed other forms of public welfare.”16 In the process such arguments “called into question the legitimacy of other forms of public spending,” including public assistance.17 Michael Brown argues that taxation is central to the development of social policy, as debates over taxation and spending determine social policy choices: “These political leaders seeking to build welfare states face conflicting demands for economic stabilization and growth (capital accumulation), on the one hand, and for creation of social rights and economic security, on the other.”18 Support for social policies hinges on who benefits, or is believed to benefit, from those policies. Expansion of OASI eligibility meant that most Americans were covered by the 1960s. That trend, in conjunction with increases in benefits, meant OASI had far more support than means-tested programs such as OAA, ADC, and AB by the post-World War II era.19 Tax policymakers, and priorities among those crafting tax policy, played a significant role in which programs expanded and which did not. Termed the “tax community” by Julian Zelizer, the group included legislators, such as Wilbur Mills, chair of the House Ways and Means Committee from 1958 to 1975, Ways and Means committee members, Department of Treasury officials, academics, and Congressional staff members.20 The Ways and Means Committee was a powerful force in parent dependency programs as it had jurisdiction over the social security programs, including public assistance and OASI, and wider tax policy. By the early 1970s the committee members “would be responsible for 40 percent of federal spending.”21 Zelizer identifies three different factions in this policy community: “Social Security, Growth Manipulation, and Tax Reform.” The first is most relevant to OASI and public assistance, and support for the former often came at the expense of public assistance programs throughout the post-World War II era. The other two categories relate to the larger goals of taxation, and to the final policy analyzed in the 16

Molly C. Michelmore, Tax and Spend: The Welfare State, Tax Politics, and the Limits of American Liberalism (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012): 7; Julian Zelizer, Taxing America: Wilbur D. Mills, Congress and the State, 1945–1975 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998): 12–14; Michael K. Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, 1999): 6–7. 17 Michelmore, Tax and Spend, 13. 18 Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State, 6–7. 19 Ibid.; Zelizer, Taxing America, 14–15. 20 Zelizer analyzes taxation and the career of Wilbur Mills, who was chair of the Ways and Means committee from 1958 to 1974. Zelizer, Taxing America, 9. 21 Zelizer, Taxing America, 40–41.

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book – federal tax benefits directed at adult children who provided significant support for aging parents. Tax expenditures can be either tax credits, taken directly off the federal taxes owed, or a tax deduction, which reduces the taxpayer’s gross income. Zelizer argues that tax expenditures, directed at specific individuals and groups, became key targets in tax reform efforts in the 1950s and 1960s, as taxation as a tool of economic growth gained traction within the tax community.22 Patricia Strach argues that tax expenditures were part of a shift in tax policy to include family in tax administration. Her analysis focuses on higher education tax benefits, often gained via a parent or grandparent taxpayer on behalf of their child or grandchild, but her argument also applies to taxpayers seeking dependency credits for their support of aging parents. Strach argues that family played an increasing role in tax policy and administration after World War II.23 Gender and marriage also played critical roles in tax policy, via both survivor benefits under OASI and tax expenditures for dependent parents. As Brown argues, analysis of policies that transcend different areas of American social policy requires attention to taxation and spending to understand their design and implementation. Opposition to taxation, concerns about protecting “the taxpayer,” and claims for benefits by taxpayers are key themes in this book’s analysis of the three policies. Support for and opposition to the expansion of both OASI and OAA were bound with who benefited – or was perceived to benefit – from the two programs; such beliefs and perceptions fostered racial and gender inequities in social policy that persist to this day. As the demographics of public recipients shifted over the twentieth century, support for the programs, particularly ADC (later Aid to Families with Dependent Children), waned and became intertwined with racist stereotypes. This fueled opposition to increased funding for public assistance.24 Exclusionary practices grounded in racism and sexism were central to the demographics of the OAI program and other programs under the Social Security Act. OAI benefits did not begin until 1940, even with the 1939 amendments creating survivors benefits under the renamed OASI. Occupational exclusions also limited access; scholars estimate that initial coverage provided 22

Ibid., 166–168. Patricia Strach, All in the Family: The Private Roots of American Public Policy (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007): 96, 103. 24 Michael Brown argues that race and money are inextricably linked in the development of the American welfare state, and the welfare state’s racial stratification mirrored the larger racism in American society. Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State. 23

Introduction

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benefits for about half of all workers, or 26 million people. Domestic and agricultural workers were excluded, as well as public employees and those employed by nonprofits. These exclusions eliminated coverage for 65 percent of all black workers, 60 percent of all women, and 85 percent of black women. Latino and Asian workers also were largely excluded from the program. Occupational exclusions prevented nearly half of all workers from contributing to or drawing payments from the system in its first decades, resulting in long-term effects on asset and wealth accumulation among those groups.25 The limitations of OAI coverage relegated many people of color and women to OAA when they could no longer work, as they were not eligible for social insurance benefits under the Social Security Administration (SSA) until the 1950s.26 In the first decades of the SSA, OAA was the major program addressing the elderly poor, and the number of OAA recipients outpaced OASI beneficiaries until the 1950s.27 Because of the limited benefits under OASI, some elderly received both OAA and OASI, speaking further to the interconnected nature of the two programs. In 1949, the average OASI benefit was $25, while the average OAA grant was $42 ($308 and $518 in 2022 dollars, respectively).28 Recipients of OAA numbered 1.738 million in September 1938, or about 21.6 percent of all Americans over age sixtyfive.29 In 1954, more than half of all elderly were not eligible for OASI, 25

Achenbaum, Social Security, 23; Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State, 71; Katznelson, When Affirmative Action Was White, 42–43; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 130–131; Cybelle Fox, Three Worlds of Relief: Race, Immigration, and the American Welfare State from the Progressive Era to the New Deal (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012): 252–256; Suzanne Mettler, Dividing Citizens: Gender and Federalism in New Deal Public Policy (Syracuse, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998): 72–74; Melvin L. Oliver and Thomas M. Shapiro, Black Wealth/White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2006); Mary Poole, The Segregated Origins of Social Security: African Americans and the Welfare State (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2006): 38–45, 176–178. 26 Achenbuam, Social Security: Visions and Revisions, 45; Edward Berkowitz and Kim McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State: The Political Economy of TwentiethCentury Reform (Lawrence, MA: University Press of Kansas, 1992): 177–178. 27 Brian Gratton, “The New Welfare State: Social Security and Retirement in 1950.” Social Science History. 12.2 (Summer 1988): 173–174. 28 Achenbaum, Social Security: Visions and Revisions, 42. OAA benefits varied greatly by state. Mississippi’s average grant was $25 in 1948 while California averaged more than $60. Berkowitz, America’s Welfare State, 56–57. 29 OAA operated in all states, as well as Washington, DC and the territories of Alaska and Hawaii, in 1938. The percentage varied by states, from a low of 7.2 percent in New Hampshire to a high of 54.5 percent in Oklahoma. Final Report of the Advisory Council on Social Security. December 10, 1938, 16.

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and most relied at least in part on OAA.30 Amendments in 1950, 1954, and 1956 greatly expanded coverage of OASI but did not eliminate the need for OAA. In 1960, OASI recipients outnumbered OAA recipients four to one, but 2.4 million aged still relied on OAA for support.31 OASI benefits were also limited, and some beneficiaries relied either on other sources of income or received OAA as well as their social insurance benefits. A 1953 national survey by the Bureau of Public Assistance found that 17 percent of OAA recipients also received OASI benefits.32 That percentage dropped to 6.7 by 1960, but the number of recipients receiving both remained significant: 675,000 aged received both OAA and OASDI in 1960.33 The trend continued; more than two-thirds (69 percent) of those added to the OAA program in mid-1964 to mid-1965 also received OASI. Authors attribute this trend to expansion of those covered, and more relaxed regulations in eligibility for insured status. That trend also indicates that social insurance benefits were low enough to make many elderly receiving OASI benefits still eligible for public assistance thirty years after the Social Security Act was enacted, and just seven years before the SSI program was created.34 Scholars argue that the Social Security Act of 1935, which brought public assistance and social insurance programs into federal American social policy, profoundly affected family relations and responsibility. In this view, the SSA was part of an ongoing trend of shifting responsibilities once held by the family to the state. It reshaped the role of the federal government and families in promoting the security of Americans by instituting a national social insurance program, albeit on a limited scale in the first decades, and brought federal funds into the categorical public assistance programs, including OAA, ADC, and AB. OAI, and subsequently OASI, required citizens to save for their retirement, provided the

30

Floyd A. Bond, Ray E. Baber, John A. Vieg, et al., Our Needy Aged: A California Study of a National Problem. (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1954): xviii. 31 Achenbuam, Social Security: Visions and Revisions, 39, 45, Alvin L. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family (Washington, DC: Social Security Administration, 1960): 22; Berkowitz and McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State, 177– 178; Robert H. Mugge, “Concurrent Receipt of Public Assistance and Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance,” Social Security Bulletin. 23.12 (1960): 12, 14. 32 Lenore A. Epstein, “Economic Resources of Persons Aged 65 or Over,” Social Security Bulletin. 18.6 (1955): 9. 33 Mugge, “Concurrent Receipt,” 14. 34 In 1965, the program was now Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI). “Notes and Brief Reports: Characteristics of New, Old-Age Assistance Recipients, 1965,” Social Security Bulletin. 31.7 (1968): 16.

Introduction

11

elderly with income that enabled many to live independently, and reduced the burden of care on their children. Carole Haber and Brian Gratton argue that social insurance reshaped the economic relationships within families and “made the aged the children of the state.”35 Andrew Achenbaum argues that the public assistance and social insurance programs provided more resources for the middle-aged by reducing the need to support their aging parents: OAA and OASI “were thus inspired by a genuine (and imaginative) concern for addressing the vicissitudes of old age in the context of the family and the passage of generations.”36 Other scholars argue that programs such as social insurance and Medicare (enacted in 1965) were critical for aging Americans, but “their adult children benefit almost as much. The financial burden of parent care has been lifted from their backs.”37 In this view, the Social Security Act enabled adult children to shift resources from supporting elderly parents to addressing the economic needs of their own children.38 I argue that consideration of parent dependency policies complicates this assessment. These policies were predicated on specific notions of family obligations and demonstrate how policymakers and those administering the programs viewed family as a means to secure specific policy goals – such as support for an aging parent.39 As discussed earlier, neither OAA nor OASI was enough for full support for many aged Americans, who looked elsewhere, including family, to fill the gaps. Policies either regulating or rewarding family support sought to gain economic resources for elderly in need by tapping into the resources of adult children. State-level responsible relative laws sought to enforce support obligations on children whose parents applied for public assistance programs, particularly OAA. Proponents of 35

Carole Haber and Brian Gratton, Old Age and the Search for Security: An American Social History (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994): 44, 65, 87. 36 Achenbuam, Social Security: Visions and Revisions, 24–25. 37 Joanna Grossman and Lawrence M. Friedman, Inside the Castle: Law and Family in 20th Century America (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011): 17. 38 William Graebner complicates this a bit with his assertion that programs in the social security act were “retirement legislation,” designed to address the problems of older workers by removing them from the workforce. He acknowledges the argument regarding a shift in responsibility from the family to the state, but also argues that old age insurance “reflected a historic reliance on the home and family as caretaking institutions” (200). The program did not seek to replace families with any institutions, and instead sought to keep people at home. William Graebner, A History of Retirement: The Meaning and Function of an American Institution, 1885–1978 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1980): 183–184, 200. 39 Patricia Strach and Kathleen S. Sullivan, “The State’s Relations: What the Institution of Family Tells Us about Governance,” Political Research Quarterly. 64.1 (2014): 95.

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these laws believed that the first line of support for people in need should be family. Survivor benefits in the 1939 amendments to the Social Security Act were conceptualized as a return on adult children’s contributions; if the deceased adult child left neither a wife nor children, dependent parents could receive survivor benefits in the interests of equity for their adult son or daughter. Providing benefits for surviving spouses, children, or dependent parents ensured that the contributions paid by the worker were “returned” via the survivor. Policy design ensured that adult children remained a key source of support for elderly parents, even after the 1935 Social Security Act. The conceptualization of family – or the family norms underscoring these policies – shifted depending on the policy. State laws regarding marriage and family also shaped the implementation of these policies. Assumptions about gender roles, and whether married daughters and sonsin-law were responsible for parental support, informed responsible relative laws and varied across states. These variations prompted dissent among family members, as daughters-in-law saw their family resources required for their husband’s parents while daughters were at times exempt from those expectations. The assumptions regarding family informing parent dependency policies remained very static across the scope of this study despite increasing resistance and demands for acknowledgment of diverse family forms. Stephanie Coontz argues that mythologizing the American family – including nostalgia for the traditional nuclear family with two heterosexual parents and children – is a recurring theme in American history and contradicts the reality of diversity in American families across the decades.40 Robert Self echoes these ideas, arguing that the traditional nuclear family with a male breadwinner “was always more ideological than real.”41 That ideological vision of family drove many social policies, including those analyzed in this book, even before the white, heterosexual nuclear family became so valorized in the 1950s. Embedded in these notions is the importance of family to American life and democracy, as well as the concept that families were independent and self-contained.42 The belief that 40

Stephanie Coontz, The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap (New York: Basic Books, 2016): 9. 41 Robert Self, All in the Family: The Realignment of American Democracy since the 1960s (New York: Hill and Wang, 2012): 9–10. Self argues that adherence to the male breadwinner model by both conservatives and liberals persisted despite expanded movements to recognize different family forms. 42 Elaine Tyler May analyzes these issues in the context of Cold War America in Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era (New York: Basic Books, 2017): 218–220. Like Self, she points to the mythologizing of the nuclear family, and its persistence in public debates – by both critics and defenders – continuing to the present.

Introduction

13

functioning families did not rely on social supports fueled what Coontz calls the “myth of self-reliance.”43 The persistent defense of the male breadwinner model was in part a response to challenges to those family norms, particularly in the social movements of the 1960s but even before.44 The categorical aid programs and OASI emerged in the 1930s, and the context of the Great Depression and New Deal are crucial to understanding how family was deployed in the Social Security Act’s programs. The family model was not consistent across policies; the male breadwinner model drove the design and function of OASI while belief in a more extended family model, fueled by anti-dependency and fiscal conservatism, underscored administration of the categorical aid programs. The extended family model was the norm in many New Deal relief programs, from the Federal Emergency Relief Administration to the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to social security programs analyzed here. While scholars have shown that many programs sought to promote the white male breadwinner, the emergency of the 1930s fostered employment of other family members on behalf of the family unit.45 Assignments to WPA or other work relief programs preferenced men and were often conditioned on the support of siblings, parents, and other relatives. Civilian Conservation Corps enrollees – only single men between the ages of seventeen and twenty-three were eligible – were required to send the majority of their wages home to support their families. Siblings assigned to work relief were expected to help support their families during the Great Depression, and case workers looked to adult children to help support aging parents receiving ADC or OAA. Enforcement of support by adult children, in both ADC and OAA, often generated conflict among families when adult children resisted contributing their income to the 43

Coontz, The Way We Never Were, 85. This trend speaks to scholars’ attention to benefits that are not perceived as “welfare” or government benefits, such as home mortgage interest deductions or employment benefits that are not taxed. See Suzanne Mettler, The Submerged State: How Invisible Government Policies Undermine American Democracy (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011) and Christopher Howard, The Hidden Welfare State: Tax Expenditures and Social Policy in the United States (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997). 44 Margot Canaday argues that the consolidation of federal policy policing sexual boundaries of hetero- and homosexuality “reveals the emergence of that binary as one of the organizing categories of federal policy in the postwar United States” (3). She analyzes in particular the Civilian Conservation Corps and the GI Bill in her chapters on these trends in welfare policy. See Margot Canaday, The Straight State: Sexuality and Citizenship in Twentieth-Century America (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2009). 45 May, Homeward Bound, 49–52; Canaday, The Straight State, particularly chapters 3 and 4 analyzing the CCC and the GI Bill; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity.

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Caring for Mom and Dad

family’s resources.46 Dependence on public assistance for support prompted policymakers, case workers, and administrators to look to the extended family model to ensure that such reliance was minimized by other family contributions. Analyzing debates over responsible relative laws provides a lens into larger debates that centered on family obligations and the role of the state. Using the voices of both opponents and proponents of support laws, I argue that both sides invoked the need to limit the role of government: for advocates of responsible relative laws, this meant reducing the tax burden on taxpayers while for critics it meant limiting the reach of an intrusive public assistance bureaucracy into the lives and families of aged Americans seeking or receiving OAA benefits. Critics of responsible relative laws, which included recipients and their families, argued that the economic security of the aged was a responsibility of all, including taxpayers, rejecting fiscal responsibility as a valid reason to enforce support.47 Proponents of such laws sought to enforce family responsibility, arguing that families should support their own before taxpayers were asked to contribute, while opponents argued that the support obligations harmed family relationships and resulted in minimal savings for state coffers. These debates focused on the intersection between the goal of security for the elderly, benefiting aged recipients and their adult children, and fiscal responsibility, which protected the taxpayer. Analysis of responsible relative laws adds to our understanding of the role of the state in regulating American families via public assistance. The regulation of families, particularly single mothers receiving mothers’ pensions and later ADC or AFDC and the fathers of children in those programs, has been well documented by historians.48 Regulation also 46

Susan Stein-Roggenbuck, Negotiating Relief: The Development of Social Welfare Programs in Depression-Era Michigan 1930–1940 (Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 2008): 99–100, 106, 156–164. 47 Ann Orloff argues that both the elderly and their adult children are key voices demanding public support for the elderly. Ann Shola Orloff, The Politics of Pensions: A Comparative Analysis of Britain, Canada, and the United States, 1880–1940 (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1993): 103. 48 On the regulation of single mothers on ADC and AFDC, and the pursuit of fathers for support to reduce public costs in the program, see Marisa Chappell, The War on Welfare: Family, Poverty, and Politics in Modern America (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010); Linda Gordon, Pitied but Not Entitled: Single Mothers and the History of Welfare (New York: The Free Press, 1994); Gwendolyn Mink, The Wages of Motherhood: Inequality in the Welfare State, 1917–1942 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995); Jennifer Mittelstadt, From Welfare to Workfare: The Unintended Consequences of Liberal Reform, 1945–1965 (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North

Introduction

15

extended to the aged receiving OAA and their family members, particularly adult children. Hendrik Hartog argues that cases involving conflicts over inheritance in the nineteenth century show that private law was the site of property disputes among surviving family members, and that “during these years, public power was rarely mobilized directly to confront or discipline wrongs done within families.”49 Analysis of responsible relative laws over their long history complicates this assessment. Public officials investigated family members’ ability to support parents and property lien laws prevented family inheritance of property if parents were supported by public assistance programs. This system of regulation is what scholars term the “family law of the poor,” or “a dual system of family law.”50 Grounded in the nation’s earliest poor laws, requirements for relatives’ support of needy family members are a key continuity in the development of more modern relief systems beginning with the Social Security Act of 1935. While middle- and upper-class Americans could choose to use the legal system to address family conflicts over property and support, poor Americans seeking public assistance often faced unwelcome investigations into their finances and those of their adult children. Chapter 2 demonstrates how public assistance recipients employed the discourse of rights to contest agency decisions via fair hearings and court challenges. Conceptions of dependency are central to this analysis, and definitions of dependency have shifted across time and place. Nancy Fraser and Linda Gordon’s analysis of the history of the term focuses largely on the development of “bad” dependency, which included any adult who was not employed for pay with particular disparagement directed at single mothers on public assistance – a trend that continues today. The valorization of wage labor was central to the stigmatization of dependency across groups, and extension of that to mothers, particularly single mothers of color. By the 1980s and 1990s, dependency discourse centered on dependency via AFDC.51 Central to this discourse was the absence of wage labor

Carolina Press, 2005); and Ellen Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers: Past and Present (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005). 49 Hendrik Hartog, Someday This Will All Be Yours: A History of Inheritance and Old Age (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012): 16–17. 50 Jacobus tenBroek, “California’s Dual System of Family Law: Its Origin, Development, and Present Status.” Stanford Law Review. 16.2 (1964): 257–258; Steven Mintz, “Regulating the American Family,” Journal of Family History. 14.4 (1989): 391. 51 Aid to Dependent Children became Aid to Families with Dependent Children in 1962. Katz, The Price of Citizenship, 4–5.

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Caring for Mom and Dad

and reliance on public benefits; Fraser and Gordon argue that in late twentieth century America, “there is no longer any self-evidently good adult dependency in postindustrial society.”52 Critical in their analysis is the type of social benefit one receives: public assistance or an earned or contributory benefit. Few expected elderly Americans to work rather than receive benefits, as many were physically unable to do so; the stigma of unemployment or a perceived unwillingness to work did not apply. William Graebner calls the Old Age Insurance program “retirement legislation” designed to remove older workers from the workforce in the 1930s; several pension movements also argued for old age pensions for the same reason.53 The elderly are often among the “deserving” in their receipt of benefits. The type of benefit – whether means-tested or an “earned” benefit – also shapes how older Americans are viewed and elderly Americans’ perception of those benefits. As Fraser and Gordon note, “Hardly anyone today calls recipients of Social Security retirement insurance dependent.”54 Instead, the benefits are perceived as earned via payroll contributions from a lifetime of wage labor. Suzanne Mettler echoes the link between independence and wage earning, but acknowledges the limits of that conception in programs for the aged: “social citizenship in the national state was linked to independence as defined by wage earning – unless the wage earners happened to be toilers in excluded occupations.” Those outside the scope of OASI – either as a direct beneficiary or a survivor – had to rely on OAA, which was a state-defined benefit to some degree.55 The role of the government – whether local, state, or federal – is also important to conceptions of dependency. Margot Canaday, in The Straight State, argues that federal policy and the policing of immigration, welfare, and the military were central to understandings of homosexuality throughout the twentieth century; in policing the boundaries of sexuality, state actors also helped define those categories. In privileging specific types of benefits in the development and implementation of policies – such as OASI and OAA – the state is also not only acting on ideas of dependency but also fostering how they are Nancy Fraser and Linda Gordon, “A Genealogy of Dependency: Tracing a Keyword of the U.S. Welfare State.” Signs. 19.2 (1994): 324, 327–328. 53 Removing older workers from employment, and providing an adequate pension, would not only open jobs to younger workers but would also stimulate consumption, helping the beleaguered American economy. Graebner, A History of Retirement, 183–184, 192–197 (quotation on 184). 54 Fraser and Gordon, “A Genealogy of Dependency,” 323. 55 Mettler, Dividing Citizens, 84. 52

Introduction

17

understood. What is less clear is how the elderly receiving public assistance – OAA or its replacement program, SSI – fit the concept of dependency. I argue that the debates over parent dependency policies were less about positive or negative conceptualizations of dependency among the elderly, as many presumed elderly Americans who were no longer able to work were to some degree dependent. The question was on whom they were or should be dependent – whether that dependency was presumed or needed to be proven varied in different programs based on either state or federal policy. The variation of these policies’ administration across states and within states translated into very different experiences for recipients and their families; similar to so many parts of the American welfare state some groups benefited more than others, and where individuals landed on that spectrum of benefits often followed their race, gender, citizenship, and employment status as well as the state or county in which they resided. The administration of policies – either at the state or federal levels – affected conceptions of parent dependency and eligibility for programs targeting needy parents. OASI was a federal program, and thus all eligible beneficiaries had access to these programs and experienced similar investigations, regardless of geography. Eligibility for OASI was not universal, but among those eligible for survivor benefits, the experience was intended to be uniform across the country, although implementation proved to be less consistent as Chapter 3 will show. While OAA was a federal program, the SSA allowed states some latitude in the administration of the program. Some states had no responsible relative provisions, other than parents and minor children, while many states enforced the support of a broader range of family members. Support enforcement mechanisms in the laws also varied, with some state practices simply asking for support but not taking action if a person refused, while other states had court procedures to enforce contributions. Geography shaped how OAA recipients experienced the program and what eligibility requirements they faced. Any taxpayer who provided the required support level for a parent could claim a tax credit on their annual income tax return. This policy somewhat reimbursed the individual providing support, rather than the parent, but was available to anyone filing an income tax return who met and could document the support requirements. Thus a recipient’s experience with the administration of responsible relative laws in OAA varied from state to state, and even within states via county agencies, in contrast to the federal tax system. OASI, also a federal program, demonstrated variations in the awarding of survivor benefits depending on administrative decisions by bureau employees although was far less varied than state public assistance administration.

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Caring for Mom and Dad

What program an elderly parent experienced depended in part on their adult children’s position as well as their own, again emphasizing the exclusions inherent in American social policy. These programs’ practices of either rewarding family responsibility (survivor benefits under OASI or tax benefits via the federal Internal Revenue Service) or regulating it (OAA) again parallel the two tracks of the welfare state: means-tested (OAA) and contributory (OASI).56 In this sense, they again reflect the “dual system of family law” in American safety net programs: one system that regulated support in low-income families, such as the aged needing OAA, and another that rewarded families through less stigmatized programs such as OASI.57 The divide was not only wealth, as family members supporting parents via OASI were not necessarily well off. Instead, parents gained access to survivor benefits via occupation (their son or daughter was covered under OASI). They could also avoid OAA if they had a son or daughter with the willingness and resources, which could be somewhat meager, to provide enough support. The creation of survivor benefits (OASI) in 1939 covered widows, parents, and children of qualified workers who died before they could claim benefits. The same exclusions that limited coverage of all workers also limited coverage for their survivors. Widows, children, and parents of deceased workers in covered occupations were eligible for OASI; survivors of workers in excluded occupations had to turn to public assistance.58 Exclusions under the OASI program also affected what parents were eligible for survivor benefits; parents of those workers excluded from coverage, disproportionately women and people of color, were then relegated to OAA – a means-tested program with eligibility requirements to qualify. Eligibility for the two programs also rested on race and gender, as many scholars have demonstrated. Occupational exclusions for OASI relegated many people of color and women to public assistance. Elderly Americans of color relied on OAA in much higher rates than white Americans: in 1962, 30 percent of all married couples of color received OAA compared to 6 percent of all white married couples. For Americans of color, See Barbara J. Nelson, “The Origins of the Two-Channel Welfare State: Workmen’s Compensation and Mothers’ Aid.” Women, the State, and Welfare. Ed. Linda Gordon (Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1990); Gordon, Pitied but Not Entitled, 4–5; Quadagno, The Color of Welfare. 57 tenBroek, “California’s Dual System of Family Law,” 257–317; see Steven Mintz, “Regulating the American Family,” 391. 58 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 141–142. On the ADC program, see Gordon, Pitied but Not Entitled. 56

Introduction

19

48 percent of non-married men received OAA and 61 percent of nonmarried women received OAA.59 The decentralized nature of public assistance and the discretion left to states resulted in discriminatory treatment, if not outright exclusion.60 Scholars have documented that people of color received lower grants than whites in many states in the OAA program.61 Tax credits might benefit adult children if their support met federal guidelines, but such credits provided no direct support to aging parents. In order to benefit from provisions in the tax code, one had to pay taxes. How aging Americans encountered parent dependency policies throughout the twentieth century depended in part on their race and class, as exclusions and discriminatory practices persisted for decades after the Social Security Act’s passage. In addition to racial exclusions noted earlier, citizenship status, which often intersects with race, was another factor in access to OAA. States had some discretion over eligibility restrictions based on citizenship, although federal officials discouraged states from requiring citizenship for eligibility. States could not exclude citizens, and states that had enacted laws requiring naturalized citizens to have held citizenship for a number of years – in some cases as long as fifteen years – had to change those requirements. States could exclude noncitizens and were more likely to have citizenship requirements in OAA rather than ADC, in part due to the number of elderly noncitizens as potential recipients. OAA was much larger than ADC in those early years, and the aged population also was significant in number. In 1939, citizenship was required for OAA in twenty-five states as well as the District of Columbia. Such laws declined over the next decade, but states were reluctant to drop the citizenship requirement when they drafted their OAA programs.62

Mollie Orshansky, “The Aged Negro and His Income,” Social Security Bulletin. 27.2 (1964): 3, 6. 60 See Katznelson, When Affirmative Action Was White, 45–47; Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State, 41–47. 61 Jill Quadagno, The Transformation of Old Age Security (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1988): 134–136; Katznelson, When Affirmative Action Was White, 46–47. 62 These laws persisted despite the financial incentive to include noncitizens, even more so than ADC. OAA funds were matched 50 percent by the federal government (compared to one third for ADC). States that excluded noncitizens relegated those individuals to the general relief or assistance program, which was fully funded by local and state funds. Cybelle Fox argues that these laws remained in place as anti-immigrant sentiment remained high in the 1930s, and removing a citizenship requirement – already in place in many state-level old-age pension programs – was more difficult politically. Fox, Three Worlds of Relief, 263–266. 59

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Citizenship requirements persisted in the southwestern states in particular, including California. Debates over Old Age Security (California’s OAA program by a different name) were largely silent regarding race, in part because citizenship exclusions prevented many people of color from eligibility. Twelve percent of OAS recipients in California were non-white in 1953; 9 percent were African American, 2 percent were Mexican American, and 1 percent were categorized as “other.”63 Ellen Reese argues that stereotypes about both black and Mexican recipients appear in the rhetoric and debates regarding ADC in California but were far less central than in other regions, particularly the North and Southeast. She also argues that hostility toward African American recipients in California’s ADC program was limited in part because most opposition to the program came from rural areas seeking to preserve access to the Mexican labor force, while most African American people lived in the cities.64 California’s law specifically excluded noncitizens until 1961. Seven percent of the state’s population over the age of sixty-five were foreign born, and 56 percent of that group were Mexican immigrants; only those who were citizens had access to OAS benefits.65 Program exclusions regarding noncitizens made the issue of race resonate less in California, as other barriers to access, including language and discrimination, further limited the number of Mexican American people receiving OAS.66 Race and public assistance were less intertwined in California’s debates over OAS and responsible relative laws; little overt evidence of racial hostility appears in the records. Reese argues that the citizenship exclusion made racism less visible since many Mexican immigrants were already excluded.

methods Parent dependency policies cross federal, state, and local boundaries. Responsible relative laws are state policies, with some local participation, with the federal SSA providing oversight but also granting states discretion. Thus state agencies and legislatures implemented these laws in very 63

Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 271. Reese argues that the high numbers of Mexican immigrants in the state, and opposition of agricultural employers to public assistance benefits for their low-wage workforce, resulted in strong opposition to relaxing residence requirements for benefits. Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers, 92–94. 65 Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 292–293. 66 Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers, 94. 64

Introduction

21

different ways. Federal records of the SSA provide important information about state programs and the conversations between state and federal officials regarding compliance with federal requirements. These detail not only the mechanics of the policies but also provide insights into specific debates in each state. Because these laws were a function of state policy, it is very much a state story. Federal records provide the perspective of federal officials tasked with oversight, which I pair with research in state records, including state welfare department reports, state archival materials (including state welfare board minutes and correspondence), published reports and periodicals, and newspaper records. Chapters 1 and 2 analyze these relationships – and negotiations – between officials at the local, state, and federal levels more fully. Identifying states to analyze more fully began with reviews of published materials outlining changes and trends in responsible relative laws, including periodicals such as Public Welfare and the Social Security Bulletin. That led me to review those states’ correspondence in the SSA records in the National Archives at College Park, MD, in what would become the first of several trips to that facility. I also reviewed a sampling of states that had no responsible relative laws and other states with these laws to ensure my sampling included states across different regions and demographics. Silences in the federal records regarding responsible relative laws indicated which states did not prioritize their enforcement, even if such laws existed on paper. State welfare department reports provided guidance on which states to explore further and a state perspective on reports by federal officials in the SSA records. State welfare publications also provided useful insights into state policies and context. As the maps in Chapter 1 indicate, these laws predominated in certain regions; the Midwest and Plains states, and Oregon and Nevada, had both recovery and responsible relative laws, but Southern states – from North Carolina to Utah – did not have responsible relative laws and few had recovery laws. The book seeks to analyze the implementation of these laws across regions. All states with responsible relative laws were in part motivated by fiscal reasons but they differed in their administrative priorities and zeal for enforcement. Many states that enforced responsible relative laws had strong beliefs in home rule – favoring local authority over state and federal power – and fiscal localism or “the attempt to minimize local expenditures and provide tax relief, even at the expense of welfare services.”67 Many welcomed federal aid for public assistance, 67

Stein-Roggenbuck, Negotiating Relief, 3.

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beginning in the 1930s with the New Deal programs and continuing under the Social Security Act, but sought state and local control over those funds. Many states saw brief shifts to Democratic rule in the 1930s, particularly in the 1932 and 1936 elections, but the change was shortlived; a return to Republican dominance in state and national offices occurred before the decade’s end. In some cases, such as South Dakota and Indiana, the Democratic Party proved nearly as conservative as the Republican Party, thus limiting the scope of change even when Democrats controlled state government. The close ideological stances of both parties spoke to the conservative politics in the state, often reflecting significant rural and farming constituencies which reinforced both home rule and fiscal localism. Indiana and California quickly emerged as states that embraced responsible relative laws but in very different contexts. In part this was due to demographics and politics. Pension organizations were one such variable. Pension movements were active in California, Nevada, and Washington, but the role of responsible relative laws varied in each state. Washington had an active pension movement and taxpayer organization, but responsible relative laws were not a major area of debate and the state had them for only a short time. California, despite the active old age advocacy movements, persisted in its use of responsible relative laws the longest, not repealing its laws and abandoning their administration until 1975. California had among the highest grants in the OAA program and Indiana among the lowest. Both states had active business organizations – the Chamber of Commerce in Indiana and the California Taxpayers Association (CTA) – that resisted efforts to eliminate responsible relative laws. Both also embraced home rule, or the power of county and city governments to play significant roles in the administration of public assistance. Indiana was the most pronounced of the two, but state officials in California also defended local authority to some degree. They are both unique among other states but also representative of larger trends, including the push for fiscal control on state and local relief expenditures. Chapter 2 draws heavily on California for its analysis for resistance by families, individuals, and organized advocacy groups on both sides of the issue, but also speaks to other forms of resistance, including the courts and fair hearing system more common in other states as well. Missouri is a unique state; it had no specific responsible relative law but enforced family support via its general support law. Its court system, which allowed OAA recipients to contest social welfare department decisions, was a state with among the largest

Introduction

23

numbers of court cases challenging family support enforcement. Thus Missouri also plays a significant role in Chapter 2. Many states with no responsible relative laws also paid the lowest OAA grants in the country, again in part due to fiscal concerns, the financial status of the state, and because of the demographics of eligible individuals, including immigrant populations and people of color. Federal records of the 1939 Advisory Council to the Social Security Board, including transcripts of the council’s deliberations on proposed amendments, document the role of parent dependency, although minimal, in the debates over how to revise the Old Age Insurance program. Records of the US House Ways and Means Committee, including their hearings on the proposed amendments, also illuminate debates regarding the inclusion of parents and conceptualizations of family. The House committee added parents to survivor benefits; the Advisory Council made no such recommendation. The policy files of the Bureau of Old Age and Survivors Insurance document rulings and debates on specific cases where parents, wives, and widows sought benefits, revealing how officials considered parent dependency in comparison to cases involving children, wives, and ex-wives. These records do not provide the direct voices of those appealing benefit decisions, but they do detail the applicants’ stories and circumstances. Together these records demonstrate how policymakers perceived parent dependency, support, and family responsibility. Research on the role of federal tax policy in parent dependency is enriched by the voices of adult children and the parents they supported via a 1966 hearing by the US Senate’s Special Committee on Aging. The letters sent to the committee, as well as the testimony at the hearing, underscore the hardship that parental support exacted on adult children, and document policy priorities regarding tax benefits for those supporting aged parents from different stakeholders. Letters from parents demonstrate their awareness of the toll their children’s support took on the children’s family, but also show the limited options available to parents in need. Hearing transcripts as well as records from the US Department of Treasury and the US House Ways and Means committee speak to tax reform debates centered on support for aging parents.

organization The book is organized by policy, and within that by chronology. The first two chapters address responsible relative laws in OAA. Responsible relative laws included requiring contributions for support from family

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members via OAA investigations, property lien laws, and recovery provisions from the estates of OAA recipients. These laws include family support investigations as a part of the application process to receive OAA, as well as the recurring investigations to ensure that recipients remained eligible for benefits. It also includes property lien and recovery provisions that sought to ensure that public assistance costs were reimbursed before others, including potential heirs, benefited from the recipient’s property. This chapter argues that fiscal concerns and opposition to federal authority were critical motivations for states to enforce responsible relative laws. These laws were an important part of the significant backlash against public assistance costs in the 1950s and 1960s. Scholars have ably documented efforts to limit aid to single mothers in ADC, but responsible relative laws enforcing the support of adult children are less recognized. Supporters often invoked “the taxpayer” as a reason to strengthen and expand support obligations. This chapter examines specific states that engaged in significant debates about responsible relative provisions, both internally and with federal officials, and illustrates the range of policies and administrative practices employed by states. The chapter also analyzes the administration of responsible relative laws at the county level, demonstrating geographic variation not only between states but also within states. Resistance to federal regulations and oversight in the public assistance programs was a key factor in how these laws operated in a given state or locale. The stance of officials – in the state or local department of social or public welfare, the state legislature, the governor’s office, or county or city government – on the role of federal authority in relief administration played a key role in the assertiveness of a state’s enforcement of responsible relative laws. Karen Tani’s States of Dependency documents the resistance of state governments and legislatures to what she calls a right to relief that developed via federal regulation of relief beginning in the 1930s; this chapter argues that enforcing responsible relative laws was a key means of resistance to federal authority. The degree of opposition to federal authority combined with a desire to protect state autonomy and local or home rule often translated into significant enforcement of responsible relative laws, usually with significant variation among counties in a state. Chapter 2 outlines the activism and opposition to the different provisions of responsible relative laws from both individuals and organizations. This chapter addresses the key critiques of responsible relative provisions, relying on the voices of recipients of aged assistance, their families, and pension organizations’ spokespeople. Opponents of responsible relative

Introduction

25

laws rejected a needs-based program and embraced the “pension philosophy,” arguing that individuals over sixty-five had earned benefits. Support for responsible relative laws, fueled by fiscal control, came from states that provided limited benefits and exhibited reluctant support of the elderly, such as Indiana, and also from states with a strong commitment to financial support for the needy aged, such as California. Several pension movements of the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s, particularly in California, proposed plans to address the needs of aging Americans, but California’s Citizens Committee for Old Age Pensions is the most critical for this project. The Washington Pension Union, in the state of Washington, was another organization that pushed for more generous benefits for OAA recipients. This chapter analyzes these organizations through the lens of responsible relative laws, with an emphasis on successful, although short-lived, campaigns in both Washington and California to eliminate the support obligations and secure guaranteed benefits for the aged. Although they did not often achieve their goals, these organizations played a crucial role in the liberalization of benefits at both the state and federal levels. Recipients and their families also employed fair hearings, the administrative appeal process in OAA, and court challenges to contest agency decisions regarding OAA grants. In some cases, these organizations helped recipients challenge those decisions, but many cases were initiated by the recipient or their families independent of any organization. The efforts of these organizations, and the use of fair hearings and the courts to challenge public assistance decisions, prompt a rethinking of the welfare rights movements, more typically associated with the National Welfare Rights Organization in the1960s. Chapter 3 turns to “earned” benefits, or benefits derived from either contributions via payroll taxes in OASI or from military service. Under the 1939 amendments to the Social Security Act, parents were among those eligible for survivor benefits if a contributing worker died leaving no widow or children. Parents had to prove specific levels of dependency to qualify for benefits – eligibility was not automatic – but once deemed eligible, parents could receive survivor benefits for their lifetime. A part of the contributory track of American social policy, survivor benefits lacked the recurring investigations that OAA recipients endured. Because eligibility was not automatic, the program represents a middle ground in the spectrum of American policies: not fully contributory but also not solely means-tested requiring recurring investigations. Survivor benefits were initially means-tested and required proof of dependency, but then were contributory, as parents were then eligible for lifetime benefits. Survivor

26

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benefits were administered under different measures of dependency for different groups. This chapter analyzes those categories, and addresses how military survivor benefits fit this analysis. Survivor benefits were predicated on different assumptions about parent dependency compared to public assistance programs. But the benefits, if an aged American qualified, removed the recipient from the intrusive and repeated investigations found in the OAA program. Chapter 4 turns to tax expenditures offered to income tax filers who provide specific levels of support for aging parents. Scholars such as Christopher Howard have demonstrated how the tax system incentivizes certain actions, such as purchasing a home, with tax benefits, usually in the form of a deduction or credit.68 The tax system provided more direct benefits to elderly Americans through their taxes, but policies also sought to encourage and reward individuals who provided support to parents in need. In this case, categories of family are key. In the case of the tax code, “the government is able to provide for the welfare of its citizens through incentives and inducements that rely on family relations. Family status not only confers the benefits of public assistance to particular individuals – and restricts it from others – but also requires family members to act in particular ways for the benefit of others.”69 In the case of dependent parents, tax policy rewarded those who fulfilled support obligations for parents by partially reimbursing them. The goal ultimately was to encourage additional support by adult children via the tax code. Debates over tax credits for taxpayers supporting aging and needy parents were the focus of Congressional hearings in 1966, and this chapter draws on those debates. A key question was how best to meet the needs of financially strained aged parents. The hearings occurred during larger debates about tax reform focused in part on limiting the number of tax expenditures available in the tax code. The chapter also analyzes the experiences of taxpayers supporting parents, often at great personal and financial cost. Drawing on letters and testimony at the hearings, this chapter uses the voices of both parents and taxpayers who argued for more generous benefits for such support. Although a small sample of parents and adult children, these letters provide important insight into the limitations of the tax benefits accorded to those who provided parents with support. The chapter highlights the toll – financial and emotional – that such support took on both parents and adult children, and their proposals for change. 68 69

Howard, The Hidden Welfare State, and Mettler, The Submerged State. Strach and Sullivan, “The State’s Relations,” 98.

Introduction

27

The conclusion addresses the decline of enforcement of responsible relative laws, and why that happened. For many states, the shift occurred in the 1960s. Medicaid provisions prohibited the consideration of family resources, other than spousal assets, in determining eligibility. Scholars argue that this prompted many states to cease all filial responsibility laws, but this is only a partial explanation. The implementation of SSI and the elimination of OAA in 1974 changed the public assistance landscape and shifted debates about responsible relative laws. Even the most persistent state enforcement waned in the 1970s. It is not until more recently that states have returned to these laws. The conclusion ends with a call for rethinking our conceptualization of aged Americans and the care and support they need. The needs of aging parents, from medical care to financial support to assistance with daily living, are a growing policy issue in the United States. The burden falls on family members, often adult children, to provide either financial assistance or direct caregiving. Such care also is a significant part of Medicaid costs as families are unable to afford astronomical nursing home care costs. This book analyzes social policies that sought to address these issues throughout the twentieth century and – I hope – conveys a cautionary tale of requiring such support and assistance from adult children. Many children of aging Americans voluntarily help their parents with these needs, but legal responsibility has many pitfalls. As a colleague aptly pointed out to me in reading this manuscript, most parents choose to have – and keep – their children, but no one signs up to be children.70 This book historicizes the question of who bears responsibility for this support and care, and who should shoulder that responsibility in the future.

70

I thank Jennifer Sykes, in James Madison College at Michigan State University, for this insight. See also George F. Indest III, “Legal Aspects of HCFA’s Decision to Allow Recovery from Children for Medicaid Benefits Delivered to Their Parents through State Financial Responsibility Statutes: A Case of Bad Rule Making through Failure to Comply With the Administrative Procedure Act.” Southern University Law Review. 15.2 (1988): 285–286; Macon. “Grow Up Virginia,” 295.

1 Resisting a Right to Relief States, Responsible Relative Laws, and Old Age Assistance

Federal efforts to modernize relief systems in the Social Security Act of 1935 faced significant challenges from state and local officials across the country. Federal policies sought to change two centuries of relief practices where local authority and funds directed policy. Indiana was one of many states whose officials resented this shift in authority, and the 1944 Welfare Investigation Commission’s report captures the profound distrust and anger state and local officials felt: “The overwhelming weight of the evidence given to the commission . . . was to the effect that both state and local boards were continually besieged by what amounted to threats from the Social Security Board . . . that if the directives of said board were not followed, there would be a withholding of funds.” The report continues to describe the efforts of the federal agency as “a flagrant and wholly unwarranted invasion, not only of the right of our duly elected General Assembly to determine what is right and fair for the people of Indiana, but is an arrogant flaunting of so-called federal power such as few have the courage or fortitude to resist.”1 Indiana’s state and local officials, as well as business organizations, were among the most active in their resistance to federal authority, but were not an isolated example. Resistance to federal authority in the modernization of relief was a recurring issue as states implemented the public assistance programs in the Social Security Act. This chapter focuses on responsible relative laws in the Old Age Assistance (OAA) program as a means to address aging parents’ financial needs while also serving as a site of state resistance to federal authority. Although 1

Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission. Official Report of the Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission (Indianapolis: State of Indiana, 1944): 7–8.

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29

a federal program, OAA was funded by state, federal, and, in some cases, local funds. States had some administrative discretion within the regulations of the Social Security Act, and many states opted to enforce family support obligations as a condition of eligibility for assistance. This chapter details the history and administration of responsible relative laws; adult children were the primary targets of these laws in OAA. Enforcement of these laws was mixed; some states had them on paper but largely ignored them in practice, while others vigorously pursued family support. Fiscal control was a driving force in their administration at the state level, and state and local officials often sparred with federal officials over their practices. Responsible relative laws experienced a resurgence in the post-World War II period in response to rising caseloads and public assistance costs. Concerns regarding fiscal control and family responsibility fueled these changes. States with strong support for home rule – the belief that local and state authority took precedence over federal power – deployed these laws most rigorously and argued for a continued role for local officials in public assistance administration. I argue that responsible relative laws were an arena of public assistance that remained under state discretion, and many states used them to control costs and contest federal efforts to modernize relief programs at the expense of state and local authority. Policymakers’ focus on ensuring that adult children provided support generally rendered the needs of parents secondary to rhetoric about family obligations and protecting the public purse.

responsible relative laws The implementation of the public assistance programs of the Social Security Act prompted significant revision of state and local relief programs. The three public assistance programs were financial partnerships between the states and federal government; the federal government provided matching funds to a specific limit in each program. Both states and the federal government funded the programs via general tax revenues. States received matching funds for the grants they provided to public assistance recipients, including OAA, but states also had to meet federal guidelines to be eligible for federal funds. Under OAA, federal dollars would match half the grant’s amount to a specific limit, which began at $30 in 1935 and reached $70 in 1962.2 Thus states that spent more on 2

$30 is $655 in 2022 dollars, and $70 is $693 in 2022. The 1962 total also matched funds provided for medical care for OAA recipients up to $15 ($148 in 2022 dollars). Wilbur J. Cohen

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OAA received more federal funds.3 The Social Security Act, building on regulations enacted via the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) in 1933, required that programs be available across the state and administered uniformly under state supervision via a central agency. Under the Social Security Act, agencies were to be staffed by trained social workers selected under a merit system. Assistance was to be in the form of cash, and recipients had the right to a fair hearing at the state level if they disagreed with a decision by the local office. Residence as a condition of eligibility could no longer be solely based on a locale, such as a town, township, or county; instead, states could only require that applicants had resided in the state for five of the previous nine years.4 The goal was to reshape public relief programs from local-centered programs to a more modern and uniform state system following federal guidelines. Conflict between state and county governments, as well as state and federal officials, occurred under FERA, and continued under the public assistance programs of the Social Security Act. Created in 1933, FERA was a temporary program designed to address the emergency of the depression; the Social Security Act was intended to provide long-term security to needy Americans. Implementation of the public assistance programs in the Social Security Act directed states and local governments to fundamentally rethink their approach to relief on a much more permanent basis. States did retain some autonomy in specific eligibility questions, including residence, citizenship, and support obligations, but their plans had to conform to other federal guidelines. Federal officials, both policymakers and administrators, sought to transform public relief into a uniform system of aid grounded in clear eligibility standards. Karen Tani argues that this reconfiguration of relief created a right to relief; absent eligibility exclusions, anyone who qualified for a public assistance and Robert M. Ball, “Public Welfare Amendments of 1962 and Proposals for Health Insurance for the Aged.” Social Security Bulletin. 25.10 (1, 1962): 13–14; W. Andrew Achenbaum, Social Security: Visions and Revisions (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986): 22; Jill Quadagno, The Transformation of Old Age Security: Class and Politics in the American Welfare State (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988): 137–140. 3 Gareth Davies and Martha Derthick argue that race was not the key reason that southern states participated in OAA at lower rates. Instead southern states lacked the necessary funds to offer OAA benefits, and also rejected federal authority; the funding partnership favored wealthier states. See Davies and Derthick, “Race and Social Welfare Policy: The Social Security Act of 1935.” Political Science Quarterly. 112.2 (1997): 227, 229–230. 4 Karen M. Tani, States of Dependency: Welfare, Rights, and American Governance, 1935– 1972 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016): 40–42; Floyd Bond, Ray E. Barber, John A. Vieg, et al., Our Needy Aged: A California Study of a National Problem (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1954): 133–154.

Resisting a Right to Relief

31

program was entitled to aid. States not only resisted federal authority over state and local relief administration, but some also rejected the belief that all eligible individuals should qualify for public assistance.5 The persistence of responsible relative laws was a manifestation of state resistance to federal authority and the subsequent increase in public assistance caseloads. The resurgence in responsible relative provisions in the 1940s and 1950s, including property lien and recovery laws, was in part a response from state legislators intended to stem the “rights” language and authority of state welfare agencies and case workers, as well as to contain costs. Eligibility centered on financial need, and, as noted, states had some latitude in what criteria they employed to determine eligibility, including responsible relative laws. State discretion created space for states to resist federal authority, in part by reducing public assistance costs by limiting eligibility or discouraging applicants at the outset. Responsible relative laws mandated support by family members, particularly adult children; if family members were able to provide financial help, the application was either rejected or the grant awarded was reduced. Property lien and recovery laws enabled state and county governments to recoup the cost of OAA from a recipient’s estate or property. These policies sought to ensure that family members provided support before public funds did, and to prevent family members who did not provide support from benefiting from the recipient’s estate.6 The millions of Americans who relied on OAA for support had to prove financial need to receive benefits, and this included investigations of family members’ ability to help elderly parents in states that enforced support laws. In the enforcement of responsible relative laws, states specified appropriate family behavior and obligations. The goal of responsible relative laws in most states was twofold: to strengthen families by enforcing the moral obligation to aid one another and to reduce the financial 5 6

Tani, States of Dependency, 39–42, 48–51. General relief, or general assistance, programs, or aid to those individuals who did not fit one of the categorical aid programs of the Social Security Act, remained under state and local control. State responsible relative laws also applied to general relief programs, but those programs were independent of federal authority and funded entirely by local governments, although some states also provided funds. Daniel Mandelker in his two-part analysis of responsible relative laws in general assistance programs argues that these provisions place primary emphasis on family support before public assistance. See Daniel R. Mandelker, “Family Responsibility under the American Poor Laws: I.” Michigan Law Review. 54.4 (1956): 498; Daniel R. Mandelker, “Family Responsibility under the American Poor Laws: II.” Michigan Law Review. 54.5 (1956): 626.

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burden on the public for financial support of the needy.7 State responsible relative laws sought to enforce specific types of “ideal” family behavior. This speaks to Patricia Strach and Kathleen Sullivan’s argument regarding the institution of the family as a means to achieve public policy goals: “what authority can [the government] muster over a family to ensure compliance?”8 Rachel Moran’s concept of the advisory state applies to the range of methods local and state officials deployed to gain the support of families: “the implementation of such policy has varied over time along a spectrum from the understated nudge to the forceful prod.”9 Exerting that authority, whether an “understated nudge” or a “forceful prod,” resulted in conflicts between federal and state officials who disagreed on the boundaries of governmental authority, and between case workers and family members asked to provide support. Enforcement also could generate discord between family members over the state’s demand that an adult son or daughter provide support for a parent applying for or receiving OAA. The obligations of married daughters – and sons-in-laws – varied between states as some states required independent income of the daughter before requiring support.10 In public assistance, the contest was over whether the state or family had the primary obligation to support the needy, and if the family member could – or should in the case of married daughters – in fact provide financial support. Responsible relative laws have a long history in poor relief and represent a continuity in many public assistance programs before and after the 1935 Social Security Act. Many states retained and strengthened their enforcement of the responsibility of relatives, particularly adult children, in the first decades of the Social Security Act’s implementation. These laws date to the earliest poor laws in the country, and include the responsibility of parents to support their children and for adult children to support parents.11 States began to criminalize desertion and nonsupport of wives and children in the early twentieth century, but the obligation for other family members to Edith Abbott, “Poor Law Provision for Family Responsibility.” Social Service Review. 12.4 (1938): 599–602; Art Lee, “Singapore’s Maintenance of Parents Act: A Lesson to Be Learned from the United States.” Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Journal. 17.3 (1994–95): 674–675; Terrance A. Kline, “A Rational Role for Filial Responsibility Laws in Modern Society?” Family Law Quarterly. 26 (1992–93): 204–205. 8 Patricia Strach and Kathleen S. Sullivan, “The State’s Relations: What the Institution of Family Tells Us about Governance.” Political Research Quarterly. 64.1 (2014): 95. 9 Rachel Louise Moran, Governing Bodies: American Politics and the Shaping of the Modern Physique (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018): 2. 10 Mandelker, “Family Responsibility under the American Poor Laws: I,” 511. 11 Abbott, “Poor Law Provision for Family Responsibility,” 599. 7

Resisting a Right to Relief

33

provide support remained in welfare laws.12 By 1935, nine states defined legal responsible relatives as parents, grandparents, siblings, children, and grandchildren in their general relief laws. Another nine states did not include siblings, and most others mandated parents and children. Just nine states had no legal requirement for relatives to support family.13 In 1952, thirty-five states had laws specifically addressing the responsibility of children to support parents. Responsible relative laws were more common in the Midwest and Northeast (see Map 1.1).14 That number remained constant as late as 1967, as did the responsibility of adult children to support parents; twenty-eight states still had some form of responsible relative law in 1988, although enforcement had waned considerably.15 Most states retained the legal responsibility of families to support one another, particularly regarding child and parent dependency, although their methods and attention to enforcing such support varied. The Social Security Act neither prohibited nor encouraged responsible relative laws, and whether to enforce such support was left largely to state discretion. The Social Security Administration (SSA) included only the requirement that all income and resources available to the applicant be considered in the granting of public assistance and made no specific reference to responsible relatives, leaving it to states to determine need. Determination of needs was to be based on objective standards used throughout the state. Amendments in 1941 sought to clarify the determination of need, and the Social Security Board advised that “The purpose of these amendments is to assure that the State agency shall give consideration to all relevant facts necessary to an equitable determination of need 12

See Michael Willrich, City of Courts: Socializing Justice in Progressive-Era Chicago (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003) and Anna R. Igra, Wives Without Husbands: Marriage, Desertion and Welfare in New York, 1900–1935 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007). 13 Robert C. Lowe. State Public Welfare Legislation (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1939): 63–67. 14 Generally, some Southern and Plains states were less likely to have such laws. Map 1.1 details the states that had support laws in 1952. Both Arkansas and Alabama eliminated their support laws in 1955, and Delaware did so in 1963. Alvin L. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family (Washington, DC: Social Security Administration, 1960): 23; Elizabeth Epler, “Old-Age Assistance: Plan Provisions on Children’s Responsibility for Parents.” Social Security Bulletin. 17.4 (1954): 5. 15 Michael Rosenbaum, “Are Family Responsibility Laws Constitutional?” Family Law Quarterly. 1.4 (1967): 58; Ann Britton, “America’s Best Kept Secret: An Adult Child’s Duty to Support Aged Parents.” California Western Law Review. 26.2 (1989–90): 352–353, 360–364.

Washington Montana Oregon

North Dakota

New Hampshire Vermont Massachusetts

Minnesota

Maine

Idaho Wisconsin

South Dakota

Pennsylvania

Iowa

Nebraska

Nevada

Ohio Illinois Indiana

Utah

West Va. Virginia

Colorado

California

Kansas

Arizona

New York

Michigan

Wyoming

Missouri

Kentucky Tennessee

Oklahoma

South Carolina

Arkansas

New Mexico

North Carolina

Miss. Alabama Georgia GeoData Source: GADM Map Author: Kasey Wilson, MSU Map Library

Texas Louisiana

Hawaii Florida

Figure 1.1 – 1952 States with no support laws Alaska

States with support laws

map 1.1 Support laws by state in 1954

Rhode Island Connecticut New Jersey Delaware Maryland

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35

and amount of assistance.”16 Thus states could mandate relatives provide support if they had the financial means, but case workers also could not ignore such income if it was provided.17 By 1946, the Social Security Board recommended that states repeal responsible relative laws, and instead use general support laws to enforce support.18 Absent an outright prohibition of such requirements, most states included the legal responsibility of relatives to provide support in their laws in the early years of the Social Security Act. Other states, such as Missouri, had no explicit responsible relative law but vigorously investigated relatives’ support as a part of their assessment of an applicant’s resources. Responsible relative laws in their various forms (support obligations and lien and recovery laws) saw a resurgence in the post-World War II era, particularly from the 1940s to the 1960s, fueled in large measure by fiscal concerns. Scholars have documented the backlash against ADC and later Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC); OAA was also a target but the dynamics in the two programs – including the role of race and region – were different. Responsible relative laws are a less recognized part of the backlash against public assistance costs in this period.19 A 1945 Social Security state letter optimistically – and prematurely – noted that many states were heeding federal officials’ advice by removing support obligations from their laws; the letter noted that just eleven states had responsible relative provisions in 1944.20 As caseloads and public assistance costs increased in the next decade, states sought to limit eligibility to reduce costs and to push back on federal authority by either

Letter from Executive Director Oscar M. Powell dated February 11, 1941, “To State Agencies Administering Approved Public Assistance Plans,” 2; Social Security Administration (SSA) Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, State Letters, Box 1, Folder 1, National Archives, College Park, MD (hereafter cited as NA-CP). 17 Ibid., 2. 18 “Public Assistance Goals for 1947: Recommendations for Improving State Legislation.” Social Security Bulletin. 9.12 (1946): 14. 19 By the 1940s, a few legislatures relaxed or eliminated their responsible relative laws, but the ideology of family responsibility remained strong. Texas and Utah eliminated relatives’ investigations from their OAA programs in 1941; Washington repealed its law in 1949. “Eligibility for Public Assistance Under Approved State Plans, as of December 1941.” Social Security Yearbook 1941 (Washington, DC: Social Security Board, 1942): 104; Eppler, “Old-Age Assistance: Plan Provisions,” 5. 20 State Letter No. 47, “‘Relatives’ Responsibility’ Provisions of State Plans Affecting Eligibility for Public Assistance,” 2; Records of the SSA, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, State Letters, Policies and Regulations Relating to Public Welfare Programs, 1942–1971, Box 1, Folder 4, NA-CP. 16

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strengthening or creating responsible relative provisions.21 Rising caseloads for ADC, and later AFDC, and the increased number of women of color receiving benefits generated significant criticism over escalating costs and the perceived negative effects on family responsibility. Scholars have demonstrated the centrality of racism to attacks on single mothers of color receiving AFDC and the focus on fathers’ need to support their children receiving public benefits. Michael Brown argues that while racism drove efforts to limit the assistance provided to single mothers in AFDC, OAA recipients actually saw increases in benefits in some states. He also documents clear differences in the treatment and rhetoric regarding single mothers on AFDC versus the elderly receiving OAA. In the AFDC program, race exacerbated animosity toward rising public assistance costs, particularly in the South.22 Brown argues that the enforcement provisions directed at fathers with minor children receiving public assistance were much more stringent than responsible relative provisions in OAA.23 I argue that OAA was also a target and OAA recipients and their families faced significant consequences from family support requirements, although the concern centered more fully on increased costs rather than racism. The contrasting views of the two groups also speak to perceptions of dependency and who was deserving or not. Labor needs and racism were central to the benefits provided to OAA recipients of color. Due to OASI occupational exclusions, black people were a greater share of OAA beneficiaries; Cybelle Fox argues that “14 percent of those accepted for OAA in 1937–38 were black, while blacks made up roughly 7 percent of the aged population.”24 Southern planters also sought to keep benefits low to ensure access to black workers’ labor, not just recipients but their families as well. Some planters feared that if benefits were too high, the entire family would live on the grant, and the workforce would be lost. One southerner opposed to the program wrote: “if they paid them, why the negroes getting them, Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 153–154; Jules H. Berman, “State Public Assistance Legislation 1949.” Social Security Bulletin. 12.12 (1949): 8; Epler, “Old Age Assistance,” 4–5. 22 Michael K. Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State (Cornell University, 1999): 198–200. See also Ellen Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers: Past and Present (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005) and Marisa Chappell, The War on Welfare: Family, Poverty, and Politics in Modern America (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010). 23 Brown, Race, Money, and the American Welfare State, 198–200. 24 Cybelle Fox, Three Worlds of Relief: Race, Immigration, and the American Welfare State from the Progressive Era to the New Deal (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012): 273. 21

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the entire family would live off the money, and they could not get them to work for us on our farms.”25 People of color received benefits at far lower rates than white recipients in the South, in part because elites believed they could survive on less. Texas legislators approved a flexible grant amount to account for “customary standards of living,” which meant smaller grants for black and Mexican populations. Again, the goal was to ensure access to labor and was grounded in racist beliefs about the two groups’ needed standard of living and how they would spend the funds.26 Ellen Reese argues that farming and business interests, and their desire to protect their inexpensive and “disposable” labor force, were key players in these debates. OAA was part of the welfare backlash in Georgia, but attacks were less harsh and OAA benefits continued to rise. While racism was central to the backlash against AFDC, Reese documents the role of large farming interests, which sought to ensure that AFDC mothers remained a source of labor.27 Because most OAA recipients were too elderly to do such work, argues Reese, they were less of a target but that did not exempt them from tightened responsible relative laws in varying forms. As outlined in the introduction, citizenship exclusions served to remove many potential applicants of color in the West, particularly California. By the 1960s, the West became part of the movement opposing federal authority, argues Annelise Orleck, and public assistance costs, and the perceived rise in fraud, were “its rallying cry.”28 While AFDC was a primary focus of critics, California’s Old Age Security (OAS) program was also a target. The resurgence of responsible relative expectations was part of both the backlash against welfare costs in the post-World War II era as well as the resistance of states to what they saw as intrusive federal authority and the concept of a right to relief. Responsible relative provisions demonstrate that the OAA program was central to these debates although the dynamics were different than the racialized attacks on AFDC mothers.

responsible relative law enforcement Officials in several states sought renewed attention to responsible relative enforcement in the face of rising public assistance costs. Because taxpayers funded public assistance, supporters of responsible relative laws believed

25

26 Fox, Three Worlds of Relief, 273. Fox, Three Worlds of Relief, 274–275. Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers, 50–54; 76–78. 28 Annelise Orleck, Storming Caesar’s Palace: How Black Mothers Fought Their Own War on Poverty (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2005): 128. 27

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that families should provide for their parents before taxpayers were asked to pay for their care. In the late 1940s, South Dakota’s state legislators strengthened responsible relative laws due to rising costs and “the feeling that children were shirking their responsibilities.”29 A review of the department’s annual reports show that OAA caseloads did not rise significantly during the 1940s, but appropriations steadily increased. Numerically, OAA cases dominated the state’s public assistance budget well into the late 1960s. State appropriations for OAA were consistently double the state appropriation for ADC until the late 1950s. State appropriations for OAA peaked at $2.8 million with a total budget of $7.4 million in 1951, when the state appropriation for ADC was $850,000 for a total budget (state and federal funds) of $2.42 million.30 State expenditures for AFDC did not surpass OAA until 1967 ($1.7 for OAA and $1.9 million for AFDC); AFDC comprised 39 percent of state funds for public assistance and OAA was 35 percent.31 South Dakota’s budget for OAA in 1943–44 represented about 31 percent of all state general fund expenditures in 1943–44 (ADC expenditures were 4 percent) but totaled 80 percent of state funds spent on social security programs (ADC expenditures were 11 percent).32 Nearly twenty years later, OAA funds represented 6.7 percent of total state general fund expenditures in 1962–63, but were 44 percent of all state appropriations for public assistance.33 Thus legislators believed this was an area to target for fiscal “Current Activities Report, February 10, 1947,” 3, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1, NA-CP. 30 The federal government contributed funds supplementing the state appropriations; counties did not provide funds for public assistance in South Dakota. South Dakota Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952, 7. As of June 30, 1963, OAA cases totaled 7,640, while ADC cases were 2,930 (with 7,900 children); the state appropriated $2.03 million for OAA and just $1.1 million for ADC. South Dakota Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1962 to June 30, 1963, 23, 58, 60–61. 31 South Dakota Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1967 to June 30, 1968, 19; South Dakota Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1968 to June 30, 1969, 64, 68. Caseloads for OAA were not increasing in the 1940s, but were consistently above 12,000 cases, far more than ADC, which totaled less than 2,000 cases (with more than 4,000 children). Caseloads for ADC remained below OAA through 1969 (4,604 for OAA and 4,131 for ADC) but ADC cases totaled more individuals (11,394 children). 32 The Budget of the State of South Dakota for the Biennium 1945–1947, 15; South Dakota Department of Social Security Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1943 to June 30, 1944, 21. 33 The total state budget for 1962–63 was $30.6 million. State of South Dakota Budget Recommendations for Biennium Beginning July 1, 1963– Ending June 30, 1965, B-6; 29

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economy. The South Dakota legislature adopted a resolution affirming the state law requiring support of aging parents by adult children if financially able, and explicitly linked it to the need to contain public assistance costs. The state legislature passed several bills strengthening responsible relative provisions in 1963 following the recommendation of a legislative committee investigating the public assistance programs. One law added the failure of an adult child to support an aging needy parent to the crime of desertion, and also allowed adult children who were supporting parents to sue their siblings to share the responsibility.34 South Dakota legislators expressed repeated concern with what they perceived to be lax enforcement of the responsibility of relatives in OAA, and the belief that children were not supporting parents when they could. Republicans controlled state government in the post-World War II period, and with renewed conservatism. The state’s Republican Party shifted from one of the most liberal in the country before the Great Depression to one of the most conservative, including an “aversion to government intervention and taxation.”35 Federal officials noted “marked hostility” between the legislature and the state department director, F. C. Drake, due to the use of funds and the need for a deficit appropriation. Drake resigned September 19, 1947, as a result of the conflict, and department officials sought to limit spending via its responsible relative laws. Workers were reminded of the need to investigate responsible relatives in a special state letter, and a review in early 1947 specifically investigated all OAA cases to ensure that relatives were not able to provide support. Legislators believed, according to state welfare officials, that the allotted appropriation would be enough “if we will ‘remove the chiselers from our program.’”36 County South Dakota Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1963 to June 30, 1964, 19–20. 34 The legislation resulted from recommendations by an Interim Investigating Committee, created in 1961 to investigate fraud in the state’s public assistance programs. South Dakota Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1962 to June 30, 1963, 12–14; South Dakota, Report to the 1963 South Dakota Legislature: A Report of an Investigation of the South Dakota Department of Public Welfare (1962): 11, 16–17. 35 Herbert S. Schell, History of South Dakota, 4th ed. (Pierre: South Dakota State Historical Society Press, 2004): 341–342. 36 “Current Activities Report, January 21, 1948,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1, 5 and “Current Activities Report, May 6, 1947,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1, 4, NA-CP; “Current Activities Report, June 29, 1948,” State Letter #8, SSA Records, Records of Welfare

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directors felt it yielded minimal results, but legislators again criticized the state welfare agency, arguing that it did not use its funds well, and needed to “tighten up the administration of the programs.” The department responded with a series of resolutions, one of which reiterated the agency’s commitment to enforcing support of relatives more stringently.37 North Dakota’s debates in public welfare mirrored South Dakota’s: the responsibility of relatives, particularly adult children, was a central concern. North Dakota’s political affiliation shifted between the two parties more than its southern neighbor, but as in South Dakota, farmers wielded considerable power in politics, dating to rural activism in the early years of the century.38 Fueling legislators’ interest in the responsibility of relatives were the increasing costs of public assistance in the state in 1947: “the real concern, however, of the legislature, was the fact that the assistance programs, according to the State agency’s estimate, required about 7 million dollars of State funds for the biennium, or roughly one-third of the total revenues of the State government.”39 The department’s request was reduced by half during the legislative session. The chair of the House Appropriations Committee believed that “the county welfare boards were being too lenient and were granting assistance to persons not in need. He dwelt especially on the matter of responsibility of relatives.”40 This led to a review of all cases for the ability Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1. 37 “Current Activities Report, May 6, 1947,” 4; “Current Activities Report, May 6, 1947,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1, 4; “Current Activities Report, February 10, 1947,” 3, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1, NA-CP; “Current Activities Report, June 29, 1948,” State Letter #8, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1. 38 Both states’ farming population was particularly hard hit by the depressed farming prices of the 1930s and severe drought. More than a third of families in both states received relief in the 1930s – subsidized heavily by the federal government. Republican Governor William Langer gained widespread support for his foreclosure moratorium in his first term as governor in 1933. See Robert P. Wilkins and Wyonan Huchette Wilkins, North Dakota: A Bicentennial History (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1977): 115–116; D. Jerome Tweton, “The Politics of Chaos: North Dakota in the 1930s.” Journal of the West. 41.4 (Fall 2002): 33–34. 39 “Current Activity Report, May 2, 1947,” 1–2, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 623.1, NA-CP. 40 “Current Activity Report, May 26, 1948,” 3, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, South Dakota, Box 92, Folder 623.1, NA-CP; “Current Activities Report, June 29,

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of relatives to provide support for OAA recipients in 1948, but early reports found that virtually no cases were closed as a result of the review. Even before public assistance caseloads began to explode in the 1950s, states pursued relatives’ support to address fiscal concerns. As in South Dakota, OAA remained a significant part of North Dakota’s public welfare budget until the late 1960s. Overall spending for public assistance programs was about 20 percent of the state’s general fund appropriations in the 1943–45 biennium (OAA represented nearly 14 percent) but leveled to around 10 percent of the state’s general fund appropriations by the 1950s. Public welfare spending was 10 percent of the state’s $91.7 million in general fund expenditures in 1952–53 but dropped to 7.5 percent in 1958–59 when the state’s general fund expenditures totaled $134 million.41 The state’s funding of OAA and ADC achieved parity in 1962–64, when state funds totaled $3.2 million for OAA and $3.1 million for ADC, although the total budgets, including federal and county funds, remained higher for OAA. By the 1964–66 biennium, total funds for OAA grants were 23.7 percent of the total public assistance budget and AFDC was 21.2 percent. By 1968–70, the state spent nearly $2 million on OAA, although its AFDC allocation had reached $3.5 million.42 OAA expenditures were a significant part of the state’s budgets for decades, thus inviting the scrutiny of legislators.

1948,” South Dakota, 4; “Current Activity Report, February 5, 1947,” 5–6, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 623.1, NA-CP; Welfare in North Dakota, Seventh Biennial Report of the Public Welfare Board of North Dakota, Bismarck, 1948, 23. 41 North Dakota’s OAA caseloads remained above 8,000 throughout the 1940s and much of the 1950s, with a peak of 9,539 in 1942. They dropped to 7,942 – the first year below 8,000 – in 1957 and were in the 4,000–5,000 range throughout the 1960s. ADC cases remained well below OAA totals, although the number of children enrolled in the program surpassed the number of elderly on OAA by 1964: OAA recipients totaled 5,387 and ADC cases totaled 1,829 families providing support to 5,583 children. Report of the North Dakota Budget Board, Appropriations Requested and Recommended, the Biennium, 1943–1945, 70–71; Report of the North Dakota Budget Board, Appropriations Requested and Recommended, the Biennium, 1955–1957, 7, 10–11; Report of the North Dakota Budget Board, Appropriations Requested and Recommended, the Biennium, 1961–1963, 22. 42 Welfare in North Dakota. Sixth Biennial Report for the Period Ending 1946, Table 8, 48; Welfare in North Dakota. Twelfth Biennial Report for the Period Ending 1958, Table 1, 60, 68–69; Welfare in North Dakota. Fifteenth Biennial Report for the Period Ending 1964, 28, 41, 94, 96; Welfare in North Dakota. Sixteenth Biennial Report for the Period Ending 1966, 20; Welfare in North Dakota. Eighteenth Biennial Report for the Period Ending 1970, 85–86.

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One key issue in both North Dakota and South Dakota was the lack of specific data on the contributions to OAA recipients by children. When legislators in both states criticized the departments’ administration, “the agency had no information to enlighten the legislators,” a problem identified in both states by federal SSA officials. Legislators’ concerns regarding responsible relatives and costs of OAA prompted North and South Dakota, in collaboration with the SSA, to conduct a study of the role of responsible relatives in the OAA program.43 The study was published in the Social Security Bulletin in August 1951. In contrast to legislators’ concerns, the study found that generally adult children were providing support to parents receiving OAA, if they were able, and very few refused to support parents at all. The article notes that some legislators believed that some OAA recipients would not need support if family would provide help, but the study findings do not support that view. The study found that “fifty-four percent of the recipients with children in North Dakota and 61 percent in South Dakota received a contribution from one or more of their children.”44 Reasons for nonsupport centered on either too little income on the part of children or unusual expenses (including medical care). Noneconomic reasons also were listed, including a failure by the agency to contact the children, poor relationships between parent and child, or an outright refusal to provide support. In South Dakota the reasons for nonsupport were fairly equal across the categories, but in North Dakota nearly half were due to noneconomic reasons. Refusal to support was the smallest of the three (just 1.6 percent); of most concern, according to the article, was the public welfare department’s lack of contact with the children to seek support. The study concluded that rates of contributions were similar to other states, and that many OAA recipients who had children were receiving aid from at least one child.45 The study’s findings, particularly the number of children supporting parents and the limited refusal to do so, likely

“Current Activity Report, January 19, 1948,” 10, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 623.1, NA-CP. 44 “Children’s Contributions to Old-Age Assistance Recipients in North Dakota and South Dakota.” Social Security Bulletin. 14.8 (1951): 3; Welfare in North Dakota, Eighth Biennial Report of the Public Welfare Board of North Dakota, Bismarck, 1950, 19–20. 45 “Children’s Contributions,” 8; G. A. Hample, “Sons’ and Daughters’ Contributions to Old Age Assistance Recipients in North Dakota.” North Dakota Welfare News and Views. 5.10 (1949): 8. 43

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explain why neither the North Dakota or South Dakota legislatures took any legislative action. Proponents of responsible relative laws focused on the fiscal implications of responsible relative enforcement. A 1938 resolution adopted by eight counties and sent to the Indiana Board of Public Welfare called for more stringent enforcement of responsible relative laws; the lack of enforcement “result[s] in unfairness to the taxpayer when taxes are required to furnish the assistance which such responsible relatives should.”46 Georgia passed both its Relative Support Law and a recovery law in 1951, in part in response to fiscal constraints in the state budget.47 After California voters eliminated the responsible relative requirements in the state’s OAS law via Constitutional amendment in 1948, caseloads increased about 19 percent during the year the change was in effect (the amendment was repealed in 1949), with additional costs of $71 million.48 A 1951 state senate report investigating the state’s social welfare legislation recommended ensuring those eligible received needed assistance but “with due consideration to the safeguarding of expenditures of public funds.”49 Containing the costs of OAA was a key motivation behind state revisions to responsible relative laws. Defending state authority against federal encroachment was a subtext of debates over responsible relative laws and intersected with rejecting the concept of a right to public assistance. In some states, a belief that the state welfare agency took the rights language too far, resulting in rising caseloads and the “pension” idea, prompted legislators to strengthen laws in response. Several states undertook reviews of public welfare policies and investigations of their welfare departments to address what they perceived to be a critical threat to the state’s fiscal health. These debates culminated in Indiana in a 1943 call for a Welfare Investigation Commission to study 46

Minutes, Indiana Department of Public Welfare, July 8, 1938, 563, Box 1, Indiana State Archives (hereafter cited as ISA); Indianapolis, IN. 47 “Old Age Assistance Act, Act No. 444,” Georgia Legislative Documents, 1951, 691, GALILEO Digital Database, www.galileo.usg.edu/scholar/databases/zlgl/? Welcome&Welcome; “Old Age Assistance Act No. 297,” Georgia Legislative Documents, 1951, 466, GALILEO Digital Database, www.galileo.usg.edu/scholar/data bases/zlgl/?Welcome&Welcome; Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers, 79; Georgia Department of Public Welfare, Official Report for the Fiscal Year July 1, 1950–1951, 32; Georgia Department of Public Welfare, Official Report for the Fiscal Year July 1, 1951– 1952, 11, 38. 48 Senate of the State of California, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Welfare, Part One (California, 1951): 34–35. 49 Senate of the State of California, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Welfare, Needed Revisions in Social Welfare Legislation (California, 1951): 10.

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public welfare administration, resulting in the 1944 report.50 While not unique, Indiana was among the most resistant to federal intervention in relief administration. The Commission and its report were in response to legislation passed during a period of Democratic control of state government in the 1930s. While Republicans controlled state government for much of the three decades before the Great Depression, differences between the two parties were not pronounced; both parties advocated for limited state government. This would change in the 1930s. In 1930 Democrats gained control of the House of Representatives for the first time in twenty-five years and Democrat Paul McNutt was elected governor. Democrats controlled both the state senate and house in 1932.51 Under McNutt’s leadership, the state approved the Public Welfare Act of 1936 to authorize participation in the Social Security Act’s public assistance programs, including OAA.52 All thirteen Republicans in the state house voted against the law, and home rule proponents – resisting the call for centralized administration of public assistance – successfully preserved some local control over those programs, including a continued role for township trustees in relief administration and giving authority over appointments to the county welfare board to the circuit court judge. The county welfare board then appointed the county’s welfare director.53 These provisions would set the stage for later conflicts over relief administration between federal, state, and local officials, and are evident in the recommendations of the state’s Welfare Investigation Commission. The Republican Party did moderate its views on the New Deal to signal acceptance for some programs, including relief programs, but as political support for the New Deal waned by the late 1930s, Republicans sought to reverse many of the programs enacted under McNutt’s administration.54 Republicans regained control of the state house of representatives and six 50

Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, Official Report of the Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, 1944. 51 The House in 1932 included 91 Democrats and 9 Republicans and Democrats held a 43– 47 advantage in the senate. Justin E. Walsh, The Centennial History of the Indiana General Assembly, 1816–1978 (Indianapolis, IN: Indiana Historical Bureau, 1987): 439–441. 52 Walsh, The Centennial History, 450. 53 James H. Madison, Indiana through Tradition and Change: A History of the Hoosier State and Its People, 1920–1945 (Indianapolis, IN: Indiana Historical Society, 1982): 121–123. 54 Walsh, The Centennial History, 450; Iwan Morgan, “Factional Conflict in Indiana Politics in the Later New Deal Years.” Indiana Magazine of History. 9.1 (1983): 37.

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of the state’s twelve Congressional seats in 1938, and gained control of both the state house and senate and eight of twelve Congressional seats in 1940 with “promis[es] to dismantle the New Deal.”55 The Democrats only retained control of the governor’s office. While more urban voters (including many black and ethnic voters) moved to the Democratic Party, rural Democrats defected to the Republican Party, in part due to frustration with New Deal programs.56 By the time the 1944 report was released, Republicans had regained control of most state offices, with the exception of the governor’s office, winning on a home rule platform opposing New Deal programs and protecting state and local authority. The Welfare Investigation Commission’s report, highlighted in the chapter’s introduction, called for a return to local control of relief programs, part of the broader rejection of New Deal policies. Five of the seven members serving on the commission – three state senators and four state representatives – were Republicans, including chairperson Earl B. Teckemeyer and vice-chairperson Samuel Johnson. The group met thirty-five times and held hearings and meetings throughout the state. All commission members, appointed by Governor Henry Schricker, a Democrat, endorsed the report’s recommendations.57 The language in the report is telling. It criticized the state board, arguing that “these powers have been abused by reason of the voluminous orders and directives continually issuing from said State Board.” The report ultimately placed the blame for this at the federal level, noting that the actions by the state board “are largely governed by dictatorial instructions received from the Social Security Board.” The result of the federal board “stretch[ing] its authority” was “bewildering, restricting and confusing local county welfare boards.”58 This has led to a situation where “the power of the local board is, to all practical purposes, non-existent and this situation in a field which has grown to be one of the largest single items of government.”59 The report also noted that conversations with state board members during the commission’s work demonstrated that the federal board was the problem: “From this we MUST be liberated.”60 Responsible relative enforcement was a central means to protect state and local authority and ensure efficient and fiscally responsible public 56 Walsh, The Centennial History, 482. Morgan, “Factional Conflict,” 56–57. “3-Member Welfare Board Proposed,” The Indianapolis News, November 16, 1944, 1; “Legislative Group Urges Remodeling,” The Indianapolis Star, November 16, 1944, 1; “The Welfare Report,” Indianapolis Times, November 18, 1944, 6. 58 59 Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, Official Report, 7. Ibid. 60 Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, Official Report, 9. 55 57

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assistance administration. The commission’s fourth recommendation was to strengthen enforcement of responsible relative laws when welfare departments grew too “passive” in their investigation of relatives. The commission sought the right of local boards of public welfare to bring court action against relatives who did not provide support. A key premise favored local control in public assistance: “Further, the entire program should be so administered as to conform as much as possible to the desires and wishes of local county boards, and their degree of willingness to accept the program.”61 This directly contradicted federal officials’ goal to establish uniform administrative practices throughout the state.62 The Indiana Department of Public Welfare (DPW) board’s response to the call for power to initiate enforcement action reveals fundamental differences in philosophies regarding public assistance administration. While the commission sought to use enforcement powers of the courts to compel support, the DPW board argued that such efforts, already available to county agencies, rarely led to financial support for OAA recipients. Instead, they tended to further harm already weak family relationships: “[Such efforts] usually cause relatives to break off all social relationships with the recipient. The department believes that it is desirable to maintain and to strengthen family relationships whenever possible, and that this can best be done by working co-operatively with the relatives and the recipient.”63 It also countered the primary goal of public assistance which was to provide aid to those in need: “The introduction of an enforcement program in the administration of the welfare act would only serve to disqualify persons in need thus tending to defeat the purpose of the whole program.”64 The state board argued that its purpose was to provide assistance to those in need, and not to enforce family relations. State legislators and Republican Governor Ralph Gates, who took office in 1945, disagreed. The report’s criticisms generated legislative change in several areas, including the enforcement of responsible relative laws, although it did not occur immediately.65 Gates appointed a new 61

Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, Official Report, 22. Minutes, Indiana Department of Public Welfare, June 12, 1940, 1070; December 1, 1940, 1150–1151, Box 1, ISA. 63 Indiana State Board of Public Welfare, “Statement by State Board of Public Welfare to the Governor and Members of the 84th General Assembly,” December 2, 1944, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Indiana, Box 34, Folder 660 (1943), 11, NA-CP. 64 Ibid., 12. 65 “Recipients AND or VERSUS Responsible Relatives.” Public Welfare in Indiana. 55.5 (1945): 9. 62

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state board of public welfare and named Otto Walls, a vocal home rule proponent, DPW director in 1945.66 Walls called for local and state administration of the federal public assistance programs, with an end to federal government regulation.67 The state board of public welfare affirmed its belief in the “moral responsibility of relatives” in 1946 and sought “to bring about the greatest amount of home rule possible under the law.”68 A 1947 law clearly outlined the responsibility of children to support aging parents in need, provided the parents supported the child until he or she was sixteen. It allowed county agencies, as well as parents, to use the law to enforce support, which Public Welfare in Indiana termed “helpful.”69 One Indiana welfare official applauded the stricter laws, arguing that “laws have educational value. They stand as sign posts of reality and stem from man’s recognition of moral values.”70 The goal was to enhance the enforcement provisions of the responsible relative laws to ensure that relatives who were directed to provide support did so. Other states engaged in similar reviews of their public welfare departments and, like Indiana, took action in response to their findings. In Maine, a legislative review of welfare policies in the early 1940s found that case workers minimized the idea of legal responsibility and seldom pushed the responsibility of relatives’ support. Federal officials commented on conflicts between the state welfare board and legislators and the significant criticism targeting the state’s social welfare agency over responsible relative enforcement. State department officials and case workers rarely enforced support of relatives of OAA recipients by 1945.71 This trend prompted a state 66

Indiana State Board of Public Welfare, Annual Report of the Department of Public Welfare for the Fiscal Year Ended June 1945, 3. 67 Newspaper clippings, Indianapolis Times, August 21, 1945, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, RG 47.8, Correspondence, Box 34, Folder 660 1943; Minutes, Indiana Department of Public Welfare, April 30, 1945, 2154, Box 7, ISA. 68 Minutes, Indiana Department of Public Welfare, June 28, 1946, 2447; Indiana State Board of the Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report of the Department of Public Welfare for the Fiscal Year Ended June 1946, 568; Indiana State Board of the Department of Public Welfare, Annual Report of the Department of Public Welfare for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1948, 912. Quotation is found in the 1946 minutes. 69 Chapter 82, “An Act to Establish Liability for support of parents.” Laws of the State of Indiana 1947, Vol. I (Indianapolis, IN: The Book Walter Company, 1947) 249–251; “Action on Recommendations of the Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission.” Public Welfare in Indiana. 58.8 (1948): 12. 70 Quoted in Dorothy Nierengarten, “We Don’t Believe in Relative Responsibility.” Public Welfare. 8.5 (1950): 102–103. 71 “Current Activities Report, June 3, 1947,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence,

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investigation directed by Stanley Bird, an assistant attorney general. Bird’s focus, according to federal officials, was relatives’ support in OAA, as well as the size of ADC grants, and he questioned the limited enforcement of relative support provisions. Federal officials noted that conversations with Bird regarding relative support were “rather difficult . . . since he appeared to have such a definite feeling.”72 Maine’s state government was dominated by Republicans in 1947, as in Indiana, and state officials also favored home rule and fiscal responsibility. Republicans controlled the governor and attorney general offices and both the senate and house of the legislature in 1947. Maine was among the most consistent Republican states in the country until the 1950s, with Republicans dominating the governor’s office from 1860 to 1954 – just four were not Republicans.73 Bird’s report names twelve assistants in the project; all were men and identified as Republican. Bird specifically thanked the members of the Committee on Welfare for their “noninterference” and noted that the assistants were appointed before their partisan affiliation was known.74 Regardless, the process was directed and executed by Republicans, most of whom favored local and state authority. The investigation prompted significant legislative change. Legislators saw the decline in responsible relative enforcement as evidence of a disturbing change in philosophy, and federal officials reported that welfare department leaders were “encouraged” to resign to protect the department’s funding. The state legislature enacted new laws in 1947 that required investigation of all adult children and spouses in Old Age Assistance cases, including “an individual sworn statement of inability to support.” Applications without these statements were denied. Once the Maine, Box 43, Folder 620.62/03, 2–3; Current Activities Report, September 26, 1947,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maine, Box 43, Folder 620.62/03, 5, NA-CP; David H. Stevens and Vance G. Springer, “Maine Revives Responsibility of Relatives.” Public Welfare. 6.7 (1948): 123–125. 72 “Current Activities Report, June 3, 1947,” 3; Stanley L. Bird, Report of Stanley L. Bird to Committee on Welfare, Ninety-Third Legislature Relative to a Study of the Public Assistance Program of the Department of Health and Welfare (Augusta, ME: Maine Senate, 1947): 2–3. 73 Three were Democrats, including Lewis Barrows who served from 1933 to 1937; one was elected under Fusion rule in 1881. Kenneth T. Palmer, G. Thomas Taylor, Marcus A. Librizzi, and Jean E. Lavigne, Maine Politics and Government, 2nd ed. (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2009): 70–71, 84; Governors of Maine, 1820–, Maine State Legislature, https://legislature.maine.gov/, Accessed May 16, 2022. 74 Bird, Report of Stanley L. Bird, 4, 7.

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ability of a relative to contribute was determined based on an income scale, the willingness of relatives to support was assumed; the refusal of able relatives to provide financially for their family members resulted in the denial or closure of the case in 1948.75 Legislators believed the department was too liberal in its enforcement and took steps to reverse those practices.76 The Michigan legislature did not conduct a formal review of its public welfare department, but like other states, responded to rising caseloads with efforts to restrict eligibility. Like Indiana, Michigan had a strong rural political tradition rooted in home rule and fiscal localism, which was fueled by opposition to New Deal programs and federal oversight.77 Like Indiana and both South and North Dakota, Michigan’s politics shifted to the Democratic Party in the 1930s, but in contrast to those states Michigan did not return to long-term Republican dominance. Instead the state shifted more to divided government; Democrats had success in state-level offices, particularly during G. Mennen Williams’ twelve years in the governor’s office in the 1950s, but neither party dominated state offices consistently. Under Williams, Democrats did not control the state legislature, making enacting the Democratic agenda more difficult. This was due in large part to Republican dominance in the rural, outstate regions of the state – again speaking to home rule.78 Resistance to federal oversight in relief administration continued well into the 1960s in Michigan.79 Fiscal concerns drove efforts to control public assistance spending, and responsible relatives were a key strategy in reducing

Stevens and Springer, “Maine Revives Responsibility of Relatives,” 123–125; “Current Activities Report, June 3, 1947,” 2–3; Maine State Department of Health and Welfare, Biennial Report, 1946–1948, 6–7. 76 Massachusetts legislators also commissioned a review of its OAA program after several years of debates over its administration, including disagreement over the support requirements. See Alton A. Linford, “Responsibility of Children in the Massachusetts Old Age Assistance Program II.” Social Service Review. 19.2 (1945): 228–233 and Massachusetts Department of Public Welfare, Special Report of the Commissioner of Public Welfare in Regard to an Investigation and Study of the Administration of the Old Age Assistance Law (Boston, MA: Wright and Potter, 1943). 77 Susan Stein-Roggenbuck, Negotiating Relief: The Development of Social Welfare Programs in Depression-Era Michigan, 1930–1940 (Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 2008). 78 Democrat G. Mennen Williams served from 1949 to 1960. George May argues that voters in Michigan were more willing to cross party lines to vote for a specific candidate. George S. May, Michigan: A History of the Wolverine State (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995), chapter 27. 79 Stein-Roggenbuck, Negotiating Relief, 224–226. 75

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caseloads and costs, with state board members urging that “responsible relatives as resources should be emphasized” not only in OAA but also in AB and ADC.80 Federal officials noted in 1947 that legislators were scrutinizing public welfare programs, particularly “the question of responsible relative in old-age assistance.”81 Federal officials believed that with the fiscal and political situation in Michigan – and the hostility toward public assistance cost increases – maintaining current programs “at its present level must be considered real progress.”82 Not all states mandated support through a specific responsible relative law, instead considering it a resource in the investigation of need. A 1960 master’s thesis offers some insight into why some states either never enacted responsible relative laws or repealed them rather than using them as a means to control costs and caseloads. The thesis, researched and written by a group of master’s students at the University of Washington School of Social Work, relied on detailed questionnaires regarding responsible relative laws to the District of Columbia, the US Virgin Islands, and the fifty states.83 Questionnaires were sent to state departments of public welfare, and were completed either by the administrator or another staff member, so all responses were from a social welfare administrative perspective. According to the authors, five states never had a responsible relative provision and another seven had repealed their laws at the time of the study. While the sample is small, the comments do indicate reasons for the lack of laws. Both Louisiana and Alabama repealed their laws due to the hardship it imposed on families, and Louisiana saw the repeal as a means to improve the economic status of its residents: “One means to achieve this has been to relieve younger families of some of the economic burden to care for their dependent aged and spend more for the education of their children.”84 Resistance

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Minutes of the Michigan Social Welfare Commission, July 29 and 30, 1947, 2, Box 2, Folder 4, RG 71–104, Archives of Michigan, Lansing. 81 “Current Activities Report – Michigan,” May 5, 1947, 2–3, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 623.1, NA-CP. 82 “Current Activities Report – Michigan,” March 12, 1947, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 623.1, NA-CP. 83 Richard Nelson, Edward Burling, Mildred Cole, et al., “Relative Responsibility and Reimbursement in Old Age Assistance: The Responsible Relative, Lien, and Recovery Provisions for Old Age Assistance in Fifty-Two Jurisdictions, Some of Their Effects, and Search for Related Variables.” Master’s Thesis, University of Washington, 1960, 12. 84 Ibid., 85–86.

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both from the families of applicants and recipients, and the public criticism that emerged, prompted other states to abandon the laws.85 What is also interesting is that while some states, such as Missouri, did not have specific laws dictating the investigation of support by relatives, Missouri had clear policies mandating investigations. The absence of a law did not necessarily mean children were not expected to support their parents, or that federal officials would not find issue with state and local administration of responsible relative provisions. Missouri’s experiences counter the concept that states rejected responsible relative enforcement if there was no law in place. Missouri’s enforcement points to the widespread concern with fiscal control in public assistance programs, and the use of eligibility criteria, even via a more broad support law, to deter and limit caseloads.

responsible relative policies as fiscal control Business organizations, including taxpayer organizations and chambers of commerce, were also strong supporters of responsible relative laws as a means of controlling costs, fueling state legislative efforts to strengthen enforcement. These efforts were part of larger anti-New Deal and anti-tax movements, with public assistance programs a specific target.86 Enforcing family obligations, which generated income for public assistance recipients, lessened the need for public funds for that assistance, which benefited the taxpayer. Supporters often invoked the persona of the taxpayer who was asked to fund public assistance benefits. Those advocating fiscal responsibility rejected the “pension philosophy” that OAA was an earned benefit to which all elderly Americans were entitled; instead, they emphasized the program’s needs-based requirements and sought to limit efforts to liberalize benefits or eligibility. The state could reduce the burden on taxpayers by limiting public assistance expenditures. This exemplifies Michael Brown’s argument that taxation is integral to decisions and policies related to public assistance benefits; it also speaks to Molly Michelmore’s argument that “protecting taxpayers” rested on a specific kind of program or tax, and criticism often centered on public assistance programs rather than OASI which was funded through payroll taxes.87 85 87

86 Ibid., 85. Tani, States of Dependency, 158–159. Molly C. Michelmore, Tax and Spend: The Welfare State, Tax Politics, and the Limits of American Liberalism (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012): 14–16. Michael Brown argues that “Money – conflict over tax and spending – is a neglected topic in the study of social policy and rarely considered as a factor shaping policy decisions.” Brown, Race, Money, and the American Welfare State, 6.

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In the OAA program, the federal government matched grants to a maximum limit, but states, and in some cases, counties, shared the burden for the remaining costs, relying on general tax revenues to fund the program.88 The California Taxpayers’ Association (CTA) and other business organizations were among the strongest proponents of responsible relative laws in California. The CTA consistently referred to California’s program as Aid to the Needy Aged, rejecting entirely the notion of “Old Age Security.” The CTA sought to emphasize that the program was assistance based on financial need and granted when other resources were exhausted.89 It supported preserving and increasing enforcement of responsible relative provisions to reduce the expense to taxpayers. Although defending the interests of the average taxpayer, the CTA “was almost entirely staffed by business leaders representing agriculture and various other industries.”90 Its mission was “to bring about, through nonpartisan and non-political means, in the interests of all taxpayers in the state of California, by mutual effort, the greatest possible economies consistent with efficiency, in the collection and expenditure of public money, to the end that taxes in the State of California . . . shall be reduced.”91 Supporters of enforcement of support obligations, like the CTA, argued that increasing benefits led to increased taxes that would lead to increased government interference in citizens’ lives. The CTA was a key opponent of expansion of public assistance.92

88

Brown, Race, Money, and the American Welfare State, 6–7. In 1943, the county share of costs declined from 25 percent of the grant (a maximum of $10 of a $40 grant) or to 10 percent of the grant (a maximum of $5 of a $50 grant). The federal government paid half the grant and the state paid the remainder. Frank H. Thill, “Old Age Assistance in California.” The Tax Digest. 21.10 (1943): 373. 89 The explicit reference to the use of OAS in government reporting, in contrast to the idea of public assistance, is referenced in “I Government Operations: The Changing Scene,” The Tax Digest. 32.11 (1954): 372–373. 90 Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers, 90. Indiana’s business leaders, and the state Chamber of Commerce, also resisted “the perceived excesses of the New Deal” as well as federal control of public assistance. Tani, States of Dependency, 164–165. 91 The Tax Digest. 3.1 (1926): 36. 92 The Washington State Taxpayers Association also opposed the many efforts by pension organizations to liberalize benefits for the elderly. Its publication, The Washington Taxpayer, consistently published articles opposing statewide initiatives seeking minimum grants for all elderly, and also reminded readers that the OAA program was not a pension but was for the financially needy. In contrast to the CTA, responsible relative laws were rarely addressed directly in its publication, indicating the different role of such laws in the two states’ public welfare programs. See, for example, “Old-Age Assistance and Old-Age

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California’s budgets for public assistance were considerable, as the CTA often publicized, and, in contrast to other states, OAS cases continued to exceed ADC well into the 1960s.93 OAA costs consistently were the majority of social welfare expenditures in the 1940s, totaling 90 percent of public assistance payments (OAS, AB, ADC) in the 1943–45 biennium.94 OAS was two-thirds of public assistance costs in 1952, compared to 26 percent for ADC.95 OAS expenditures were still 42 percent of all public assistance costs in 1964–65, compared to 30 percent for AFDC.96 Public assistance expenditures comprised about 9 percent of the state’s total expenditures that year.97 By 1969, AFDC spending outpaced OAS funds, $199 million to $161 million.98As in other states, public assistance costs, including OAS, were a significant part of the state’s public welfare budget, and responsible relative laws were seen as a way to control costs without reducing grants. The perceived cost of eliminating responsible relative requirements was the key reason for their persistence in California. Legislators, business advocates, the CTA, and the state Chamber of Commerce consistently pointed to the cost to taxpayers if responsible relative laws were repealed. The CTA’s The Tax Digest repeatedly highlighted the effect repealing responsible relative laws would have on public assistance costs, estimating in 1945 that eliminating support obligations would cost more than $2 million in contributions paid by relatives to recipients as support. Benefits,” The Washington Taxpayer. 4.9 (1939): 4; “The New Pension Proposal: An Initiative Measure Planned,” The Washington Taxpayer. 5.3 (1939): 2. 93 Its caseloads also were significantly higher than most states. A review of annual reports of the Department of Social Welfare shows that caseloads reached 274, 401 in 1951 for OAS, and remained above 260,000 for the next ten years – significantly higher than those in states already discussed. They reached a new high in 1966 at 275, 192. ADC caseloads were much lower in the 1950s, but show a steady increase each year. The number of children receiving ADC benefits approached the OAS caseload by the early 1960s (247,200 children in 86,900 families in 1962 compared to 254,300 OAS recipients), but the numbers of families – or cases – receiving ADC did not. State of California Department of Social Welfare Annual Report, 1962–1963, 10–11. 94 State of California Budget for the Biennium, July 1, 1945 to June 30, 1947, Submitted by Governor Earl Warren to the California Legislature, Fifty-Sixth Session, 1945, 740. 95 State of California Department of Social Welfare Annual Report, July 1, 1950 to June 30, 1952, 18. 96 Public Welfare in California, Annual Statistical Supplement, 1964–1965, Table 1. 97 State of California Support and Local Assistance Budget for the Fiscal Year July 1, 1965 to June 30, 1966 Submitted by Governor Edmund G. Brown to the California Legislature, 1965 General Session, x. 98 State Budget for California for Support and Local Assistance, 1970–1971, Submitted by Governor Ronald Reagan to the California Legislature, 1970 General Session, 743.

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Removing those obligations would also foster more applicants, which would add about $60.7 million to the program cost to fund those benefits.99 The journal consistently reported on the rising cost of public assistance, including OAS. A 1953 article detailed those rising costs, pointing in part to the high grants paid in the state: the state’s average OAS grant was $69.97 per month, second only to Colorado, compared to the national average of $48.44. The same article listed inadequate responsible relative laws and enforcement of those laws, including recovery provisions, as key reasons for the high costs in the state.100 Other sources echoed the CTA’s assessment. Estimates in 1943 for the Governor’s Committee on Old Age Pensions were that repeal of the responsible relative provisions would cause OAS costs to “become huge.” Relatives contributed about $2.75 million to OAS recipients, and if the law was repealed, that could be transferred to taxpayers (although some relatives likely would continue to contribute to their family’s support).101 The majority report issued by the committee, and a state welfare agency report, recommended the retention of responsible relative laws because their repeal would prompt new applications, costing an estimated 15 percent or $12 million for new cases.102 The committee’s report estimated administrative costs at $3 million, but believed the costs of eliminating the support provisions were far more than administrative expenses.103 The state welfare agency estimated that a proposed bill to eliminate responsible relative requirements would increase OAS expenditures by $75 to $100 million over two years.104 A 1950 study of California’s OAS program bluntly stated that it was impossible to know what the exact costs were, but noted that administrative costs for the ‘“Welfare’ Legislation: Bills to Liberalize Aid Proposed,” The Tax Digest. 23.5 (1945): 157. 100 Ronald H. Born, “Why Is Aged Aid Cost High?” The Tax Digest. 31.2 (1953): 50–51. 101 “Notes for Governor’s Pension Committee,” 10–11, Box 1, Folder 4028, Earl Warren Papers, Governor’s Committee on Old Age Pensions, CSA. 102 “Report of Citizens’ State-Wide Committee on Old-Age Pensions,” March 31, 1943, 17, Box 1, Folder 4029, EWP, GCOAP, CSA; Floyd A. Bond, Ray E. Baber, John A. Vieg, et al. Our Needy Aged: A California Study of a National Problem (New York: Henry Holt and Company): 316; California State Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 6, Folder 111, December 15, 1949, 60; Margaret Greenfield, Administration of Old Age Security in California (Berkeley, CA: University of California, Bureau of Public Administration 1950): 46, 44. 103 Greenfield, Administration of Old Age Security in California, 44. 104 “Current Activity Report for Period January 21, 1945 to April 10, 1945,” 4, Box 9, Folder 623.1/03, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance Correspondence, California, Box 12, Folder 672.11, NA-CP. 99

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entire program were just 5 percent in 1947–48, and investigations for relatives’ support were just one part of those costs.105 Other studies questioned the financial value of responsible relative enforcement in California. A 1944 study of responsible relative contributions and cost by the California DSW found that relatives were contributing about $3 million, but just $2 million actually reduced the size of recipient grants. One-third of the contributions had no effect on the size of grants awarded or paid but addressed unmet needs in recipient’s budgets.106 The report was revisited in 1949 as debates over the responsible relative provisions continued. A memo detailing more of the report’s findings noted that half of all relatives providing contributions were not legally required to do so. An analysis of the 1949 caseload found that 60 percent of all contributions did not reduce the size of the grant but provided items not covered by the recipient’s assistance.107 The Citizens Committee on Old Age Pensions (CCOAP), an advocacy group for OAA recipients, also argued in 1943 that enforcement of the provisions cost more than the contributions collected: “this provision yields but an insignificant sum toward the payment of old age pensions and with the high cost of snooping by an army of social workers, is an added expense to taxpayers.”108 Many relatives contacted did not make any contributions to offset the costs of investigations.109 The 1960 study of responsible relative laws also questioned the belief that responsible relative laws resulted in a financial gain for states. The study’s surveys of state departments of welfare across the United States yielded a more complicated assessment, as the 1944 California study did. Of the twenty-seven states with responsible relative laws responding, just fourteen states had specific data that pointed to a link between stronger 105

Greenfield, Administration of Old Age Security in California, 44. The remainder covered needs in excess of the recipient’s budget. “Preliminary Report,” Circular Letter No. 290, March 2, 1945, 1. Social Welfare Board, Old Age Security, CSA. The report was never fully issued, and a DSW administrator noted in a 1949 board meeting that it “was kind of suppressed,” apparently because the department director decided not to continue it. California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 6, Folder 111, December 15, 1949, 59–60; Department of Social Welfare, Records of the Social Welfare Board, CSA. 107 Memo to John McLaughlin from Elizabeth MacLatchie, December 16, 1949, Box 170, Folder 10, Department of Social Welfare, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA. 108 Citizens’ Committee for Old Age Pensions, “To the Members of the Governor’s Committee for Study and Report on Old Age Pensions,” 3, Box 1, Folder 4028, Earl Warren Papers – CCOAP, CSA. 109 Ibid., 1–2. 106

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laws (or enforcement) and a decline in caseloads or costs. But many states saw those trends explained by more than just responsible relative laws.110 The report concluded that few states had specific data regarding the cost and benefit of these laws, or when reporting such data, ignored the administrative costs of enforcing the provisions. Many states could not even document how many OAA recipients received contributions from relatives. The study found that “there is even less research basis for the states’ opinions than there is unanimity of opinion,” and also cautioned against “[under-rating] the value of the experience of welfare administrators” in their assessment of the laws’ effects.111 Proponents of fiscal control argued that steady liberalization of the OAS’s provisions, including increasing grants, a more generous relative contribution scale, and other changes furthered the shift from family responsibility to the state – and taxpayers. One welfare director wrote in 1959: “In the height of prosperity, public welfare is moving by legislation farther and farther from the concept of family responsibility and is encouraging the philosophy that financial problems should not be solved at the family level but should be referred to the Department of Public Welfare.”112 While critics of responsible relative laws saw enforcement as intrusion by the government into family life, supporters viewed them as a key way to limit the role of government by controlling public assistance costs and thus limiting taxes. Proposals to minimize or repeal support obligations were a dangerous trend according to one critic in The Tax Digest: “The moral responsibility of adult children to help in the financial support of their elders must continually be emphasized if we are to be a society free from more and more government intervention.” The call to save families from the burden of support, the author argued, focused “on relieving everyone but the taxpayers from the contributing.”113 Implementation of California’s Proposition 4 in 1949 validated many concerns about the increasing costs of OAS. Proposition 4, approved by voters in November 1948, inscribed in California’s Constitution key changes to the state’s OAS program and its administrative structure, including an end to responsible relative obligations. It guaranteed funding for OAS as a “first lien” on the state treasury and increased minimum grants to $75 for OAS recipients. The age of eligibility was lowered from sixty-five to Nelson et al., “Relative Responsibility and Reimbursement in Old Age Assistance,” 50. Ibid., 51. 112 Reed K. Clegg, “In Fresno County . . . Welfare for Whom?” The Tax Digest. 37.8 (1959): 167. 113 Robert C. Brown, “Relatives’ Responsibility Law,” The Tax Digest. 38.12 (1960): 272, 284. 110 111

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sixty-three, although grants for any recipients under sixty-five would be financed solely by the state as federal matching funds were not permitted.114 Liberalizing eligibility requirements fostered an increase in applications. Caseloads for OAS increased by 2,803 the month after the proposal passed, and an additional 2,989 cases the next month (January 1949).115 The Department of Social Welfare estimated that the combined caseloads of both OAS and AB would rise from 242,500 when the proposal passed to 358,700 by June 1951. The DSW projections identified 74,900 of those cases resulting from repeal of a responsible relative provision.116 A 1951 senate report on the DSW argued that the proposal added $76 million to the cost of OAS and AB.117 In addition to the increased caseload and costs, a key contentious part of the proposal was the “lien” on the state budget for the public assistance programs, which privileged funding for OAS recipients over all other budget items. The movement for repeal mobilized quickly, comprised of an array of organizations, from the usual anti-tax groups (the CTA and the Chamber of Commerce) to the California Council for the Blind to education and social welfare groups. Key opponents of the repeal movement were labor groups and the CCOAP.118 Voters repealed the amendment by 408,155 votes (about 2.6 million votes were cast) but debates over the responsible relative laws continued.119

the power of local officials Indiana officials’ desire to retain control over its welfare administration, and to preserve and strengthen local authority over relief practices, clashed with the SSA’s encouragement of uniform enforcement policies Floyd Bond refers to the proposal as “The Great ‘Sleeper’ Measure,” as few expected it to pass and the opposition was surprised by the campaign’s success. The proposition also eliminated county administration as well as the responsible relative obligations and named Myrtle Williams, a long-time associate of McLain, as director of the state department. Bond et al., The Needy Aged, 83, 85. $75 is the equivalent of $922 in 2022 dollars. 115 Greenfield, Old Age Security in California, 14. 116 Elizabeth Perina, Old Age and Blind Security Programs in California, Proposition No. 4 (Berkeley, CA: University of California, 1949): 14. 117 Senate of the State of California, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare, Part One: State Department of Social Welfare under Article XXV (Sacramento, CA: Senate of the State of California, 1949): 36. 118 Perina, Old Age and Blind Security Programs in California, Proposition No. 4, 19; Bond et al., The Needy Aged, 87–90; Susan Stein-Roggenbuck, “‘This Responsible Relative Racket’: The Persistence of Family Support Obligations in California.” Social Service Review. 91.4 (2017): 661–662. 119 Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 91; Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers, n. 15, 238. 114

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across the state. These conflicts would prompt the creation of the Welfare Investigation Commission in 1944 and its subsequent report. Federal reviews document the belief that Indiana officials – and those in other states – needed federal oversight and intervention. Federal officials not only engaged with state officials, both inside and outside the welfare departments, but also with local officials and their organizations in negotiating the terms of public assistance administration. Indiana was one of many states that saw relatives’ support as a critical part of welfare administration, and its practices were common among states that enforced such support. The degree of conflict between Indiana and federal officials was among the most intense, but the issues at the heart of those conflicts represented more widespread dissatisfaction with federal regulations in the public assistance programs. Despite the disagreements over local authority, many states welcomed federal funds for public assistance. By 1937 all but one state (Virginia) had OAA programs and forty states had adopted ADC.120 To receive funds, state programs had to demonstrate conformity with federal requirements. All state plans for public assistance, and any legislative changes, had to be approved by the Social Security Board (SSB). The SSA used an administrative review process to assess state plans and operations, submitting detailed reports to federal officials on the status of state plans. Officials responsible for these reviews were in the Bureau of Public Assistance (BPA) in the SSA, which communicated directly with states and conducted on-site reviews of state programs, and the Office of General Counsel which ruled on all state plans and approved all communications with the states. Officials in the Bureau of Accounts and Audits monitored the fiscal solvency of state programs and ensured that all funds were expended according to federal and state guidelines.121 Federal officials were to conduct annual reviews of state programs, including casework practices, by assessing a sample of caseloads in different counties. In more “problematic” states, such reviews were more indepth. All plans had to be approved not only by the BPA, but also the General Consul and the Bureau of Accounts and Audits. Proposed and passed legislation had to be approved as well, to ensure it conformed with federal guidelines. The reports conducted by federal officials are a window

120

Suzanne Mettler, Dividing Citizens: Gender and Federalism in New Deal Public Policy (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998): 159. 121 Tani, States of Dependency, 44–47; William L. Mitchell, “The Administrative Review in Federal-State Social Security Programs,” Social Security Bulletin. 9.7 (1946): 10–12.

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into federal officials’ views of different state and local operations, and what issues mattered most to them. They include comments on local and state welfare board politics as well as the relationship of legislators and governors with state and private agencies. All are from the federal perspective, and rarely name individuals, unless they are state government or welfare agency officials. They often describe groups of people, such as local officials, but rarely include details about specific individuals or give significant voice to them. The reviews also contain reports generated by state departments or local officials, including the Welfare Investigation Commission report cited in the introduction, or materials from pension or other advocacy groups. They provide a valuable window into not only relations between the different levels of government as public welfare administration is reconfigured in these years, as Tani documents so beautifully, but also on specific issues, including responsible relative laws and recovery and lien provisions. The federal reviews reveal the contests over administration of public assistance programs. William Mitchell, assistant executive director of the SSB, wrote in 1946 that the key goals of these reviews were “conformity, information, improvement,” but not all agreed. Mitchell offers a positive assessment of the reviews, noting that “state agencies, with few exceptions, have commended the process and have accepted the conclusions.”122 In some circumstances, he was no doubt accurate. State boards with cooperative legislators and other officials interested in conforming to professional social work standards of eligibility would see a positive outcome to these reviews. State welfare department officials and board members, legislators, local officials, and business leaders had different definitions of best practices in relief administration. These reports point to significant conflicts and disagreements between different constituencies within a state. Local officials were very important in these debates, according to Tani: “Lurking in the background, however, was a more formidable problem: the lack of federal or state control over what happened at the local level, where public assistance funds passed into the hands of the poor.”123 Contests over local authority were central to debates about the provisions relating to relatives’ support in the OAA programs. Indiana’s 1936 welfare law favored local control as much as possible, and thus the state DPW left discretion on responsible relative enforcement to counties. The result was significant administrative variation throughout the 122 123

Mitchell, “The Administrative Review in Federal-State Social Security Programs,” 10, 12. Tani, States of Dependency, 49.

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state; relatives in one county were investigated very differently, if at all, from other counties. Social security officials were sharply critical of the lack of state oversight which fostered local variations in administration.124 Federal reviews in 1942 and 1943 examined numerous counties in detail. The reviews documented specific cases in each county and highlighted issues, including responsible relative policies, that needed attention in the eyes of federal officials. The problems were first brought to the SSB in late 1940 and nearly three years later an official argued that the review’s findings demonstrated “the apparent futility of continued negotiations with State officials in regard to certain practices and the failure of the State agency to establish policies which are fundamental to the progressive development of the programs in Indiana.”125 Such criticism is a recurring theme in the federal reviews of the state’s programs, but the 1943 review addressing the previous three years targeted the application of relative support provisions as a key problem in the state’s public assistance structure. Public Welfare in Indiana, published by the state DPW, also criticized the state’s 1936 Welfare Act, which did “not attempt to define or to set up standards by which the ability of legally responsible relatives should be measured.”126 In practice, counties in Indiana exercised significant discretion over how to investigate relatives’ support, pointing to the state’s preference for local authority. For many counties, relatives living in the county were interviewed by the case worker to determine their ability to support, and all legally responsible relatives were required to complete a statement regarding their ability (or not) to support family members. Those outside the county were contacted via letter and asked to complete a statement of support. While these investigations of relatives were deployed in all three public assistance programs, “it is in the old-age assistance program that the State Department has developed the most comprehensive and detailed suggestions and regulations regarding the consideration of relatives’ resources.”127 The county’s consideration of relatives’ resources, compared to other resources (such as income or assets), received “conspicuous “Indiana-Administrative Review-Major Administrative Problems,” July 23, 1943; Henry J. Meyer, “Responsibility of Relatives,” Public Welfare in Indiana. 54.6 (1944): 7. 125 “Indiana-Administrative Review-Major Administrative Problems,” July 23, 1943, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, State Files, Box 32, Folder 620.6; Meyer, “Responsibility of Relatives,” 7. 126 Meyer, “Responsibility of Relatives,” 7. 127 “Administrative Review of Public Assistance in Indiana: Analysis of Major Administrative Problems.” May 31, 1943, 12. SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance Correspondence, Box 32, Folder 620.62/03. The review covered 1940–1942. 124

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emphasis.”128 The central problem, according to federal officials, was the action taken once relatives were determined able to support the applicant, usually a parent. Some counties used the availability principle, which only considered contributions that were actually received. But in others, if relatives were deemed able to support the applicant, or the recipient in a reinvestigation, the application was denied or the grant canceled, even if the relative did not provide the financial support. Federal officials called the regulations “rigid” and the determination of support final. There was no immediate appeal, “even though the relative may not in fact be able to make such a contribution since the individual county department’s relatives’ resources measurement methods may not result in a true reflection of the actual financial ability of the relative.”129 Maine’s revised laws in 1947 enacted a similar practice of considering any support – whether received or not – as income and either reducing the individual’s grant or rejecting the application altogether. The result, according to federal officials, was that the recipient did not have the resources the department deemed necessary for his or her support.130 Counting resources that were not available to recipients was a central problem in Indiana, and it only occurred, according to SSA reviews, in the consideration of relatives’ resources. Porter County was commended for its “thoughtful handling of relative support,” but the same report criticized the agency for “decisions which appear to be socially unsound” and its rigidity in enforcing family responsibility. At times agency officials denied applications for resources that were not actually available to the applicant. Others did not determine the relatives’ income or budget needs, but simply decided the relatives were able to provide support. In some cases simply having adult children indicated their ability to provide support.131 The 1942 federal review in Lawrence County noted that “the agency’s practice in dealing with relatives’ 129 Ibid., 10. “Administrative Review,” July 23, 1943, 14. “Current Activities Report, July 14, 1947,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maine, Box 43, Folder 620.62/03, 4, NA-CP; Massachusetts was another state that included relatives’ expected support and not what was actually received in its budgets. This was revised by the legislature in 1943. See Alton Linford, “Responsibility of Children in the Massachusetts Old Age Assistance Program II: Legislation and Administration, 1936–43.” The Social Service Review. 19.2 (June 1945): 219–221, 230. 131 Porter County, “Discussion of Findings, Administrative Review,” January 1, 1946 to June 30, 1946, 6, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Box 32, Folder 620.61/03 Porter County; “Administrative Review of Public Assistance in Indiana,” May 31, 1943, 16. 128 130

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resources lacks definition, uniformity and logic,” and the county director admitted that many of its complaints stemmed from those investigations. The report argued that the county’s “evaluation of relatives’ resources is so inadequate and fraught with inequity as to demand complete and immediate review of the entire situation.”132 In contrast, Adams County was commended for its “reasonable and realistic” policy regarding relative support in part because case workers only considered relative contributions that were actually received.133 These reviews point to the varied administration across the state, the persistence of home rule beliefs, and the reluctance or unwillingness of state agency officials to enforce more consistency. Problems of uniformity were not solely the domain of states supportive of local control. Michigan’s state public welfare department officials endeavored to achieve uniform application of its public assistance policies, including responsible relatives, but encountered deep resistance from home rule proponents. Township supervisors continued to wield significant influence in relief administration, even in the federal aid programs, long after the state reorganized its welfare programs in 1939. Local officials resented both state and federal intrusion in relief, and believed they were better able to administer public assistance.134 Federal officials also found considerable variation in the investigation and application of responsible relative provisions, despite state officials’ efforts to promote uniformity. Interestingly, state officials’ efforts to provide detailed instructions often resulted in “deprivation among applicants and recipients and injudicious treatment of relatives.”135 Federal officials were blunt in their assessment of the state’s policies and its staff: “The equitable administration of the many restrictive policies which the agency has adopted calls for a much higher degree of professional skill . . . than the average worker in “Administrative Report for Lawrence County,” Period Ending September 1942, Lawrence County, SSA records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Box 32, Folder 620.621/03, 14. 133 Adams County, “Administrative Review Report for Adams County,” March 13, 1943, period ending September 1942, 21. SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Box 32, Folder 620.621/ 03, Adams County; Noble County, “Noble County Administrative Review Report,” February 23, 1944, period ending September 30, 1943, 13–14. SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Box 32, Folder 620.621/03, Noble County. 134 See chapter 6, “A Contest for Local Control,” in Stein-Roggenbuck, Negotiating Relief. 135 “Third Annual Review of Administration of Public Assistance in Michigan.” 1943, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 132

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Michigan possesses.”136 A central problem was, as in Indiana, that case workers considered the expected support as income whether it was received or not.137 Missouri’s agencies also were criticized for their restrictive standards in determining need, particularly in relation to relatives’ support. A state without a responsible relative law, as noted earlier, Missouri’s DPW required the investigation of relatives’ resources as a matter of policy, particularly for relatives living with family.138 State policies rested on a definition of “bona fide family” which included all kinds of relationships “with the possible, but not necessary, exception of distant relatives and friends who are unwilling to support the applicant or recipient.”139 Enforcement of responsible relative provisions, despite the absence of a law specifically mandating such support, was a key problem identified by federal officials in numerous reviews. It was typically the resource that was not verified as income but counted in the determination of eligibility and the amount of a grant. This policy fell the hardest on “eligible individuals living in self-supporting families.” Agency officials expected the family to support the person in need, even though “those relatives were themselves on the borderline of need.”140 Federal officials also linked the problem to resistance of agency staff to federal reviews and to the state “administrator’s deep-seated convictions regarding State’s rights and the inadvisability of any sort of Federal participation in the State’s program outside of financial contributions.” Home rule sentiments again shaped interactions of federal and state officials.141 Missouri’s state administrator was deeply resentful of federal intervention in its relief administration, according to federal officials. Contrasting philosophies of public assistance often underscored the practices advocated by state and local officials. The consideration of “Current Activities Report – Michigan,” July 9, 1948, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 623.1, NA-CP. 137 “Third Annual Review,” 21–22. 138 “Report of Review of State and Local Administration, State of Missouri, for the Review period July 1, 1943, through June 30, 1944,” 4, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 139 “Report of Review,” Missouri, 3–4. 140 “Fourth Annual Administrative Review, 7/1/43–6/30/44,” 1, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP; “Report of Review,” Missouri, 3. 141 “Fourth Annual Administrative Review,” Missouri, 2. 136

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“fictitious” or assumed income – income that was considered in determining need but was not necessarily available or actually received by the applicant – was a recurring criticism by the SSB regarding responsible relative laws in many states. The different views on this policy speak to conflicts regarding the purpose of public assistance illustrated by federal guidelines and conflicts with states such as Indiana. For federal officials, the main concern was laws that rendered applicants ineligible if a relative was deemed able to provide support but left the applicant with no assistance.142 A 1939 report noted that “experience has also indicated that assistance that is forced is not usually to be relied upon,” a recurring theme in the history of the administration of such laws.143 The SSA discouraged responsible relative laws as they threatened support likely needed by the recipient. By 1945, the SSB encouraged states to eliminate responsible relative laws.144 Counting resources not actually received by recipients often resulted in significant hardship for applicants, who were denied aid or suffered reduced grants, but did not receive the required help from family members.145 A 1953 bulletin by the Federal Security Agency (formerly the Social Security Administration) noted policies such as requiring parents to use the courts to enforce support moved the public assistance agency out of its realm and into that of law enforcement. The agency viewed most specific requirements in terms of eligibility, such as responsible relative laws, as unnecessary; the goal was to help people in need.146 The SSB sought to ensure all those eligible received assistance, promoting the idea of a right to relief that many state and local officials deeply opposed. Indiana’s state board of public welfare’s commitment to both the enforcement of responsible relatives and the discretionary authority of counties in their administration of those laws fostered conflict with county and state officials. Indiana’s state board was at times leaning toward State Letter No. 47, “‘Relatives’ Responsibility’ Provisions of State Plans Affecting Eligibility for Public Assistance,” March 5, 1945, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, State Letters, Box 1, Folder 4. Mandelker, “Family Responsibility under the American Poor Laws: II,” 627. 143 “Public Assistance,” Social Security Yearbook. 3 (1940): 161. 144 “Public Assistance: ‘Relatives’ Responsibility’ Provisions of State Laws.” Social Security Bulletin. 8.3 (1945): 17; “Public Assistance,” Social Security Yearbook. 3 (1940): 161; State Letter 47, 1–3. 145 “Public Assistance: ‘Relatives’ Responsibility’ Provisions of State Laws,” 17. 146 Federal Security Agency, “Public Assistance Goals, 1953,” 17–18, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, State Letters, Box 2, Folder 5. 142

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federal views of public assistance, with the key goal to ensure that people had enough support, but that often conflicted with counties’ views, who were in part seeking to limit public assistance costs. In a 1940 discussion of the policies, board members emphasized their belief in county discretion. One board member noted that “it had been the policy of the State Department to leave to the local community as much responsibility as possible,” including the determination of available resources, and another said that he “was in sympathy with keeping the county boards responsible.”147 The result was inconsistency in OAA administration. Martha Phillips, from the SSA’s BPA, met with the board in 1940 to encourage board members to rethink its policies. The discretion left to counties caused variation across the state and could harm family relations. Letting counties decide what resources held by relatives were available would cause resentment, “as they are not a relief family,” and requiring court action by the applicants “may result in a serious breakdown in the relationship.”148 While the practice was not required of counties, the option to pursue court action again contributed to the varied practices across the state. Under DPW policies, an applicant who was denied aid because of relatives’ ability to support had to wait sixty days to reapply; no immediate appeal was available. If case workers found that the relative did not provide support, but the individual was otherwise eligible, they could receive a grant.149 Phillips asked the board “if the regulations would not put the county departments in the position of dictating to a family the way they should live.”150 The SSA did not prohibit laws mandating relatives’ support, but Phillips felt this level of intrusion in a family’s life was punitive and conflicted with federal goals of public assistance. The state board’s commitment to the principle of relatives’ support obligation and county discretion was evident in these discussions. Despite the conversation with Phillips, the board retained the sixty-day reapplication period, although no specific reason was articulated in the meeting. The reapplication delay was likely intended to prompt relatives to provide support, as no financial assistance would be immediate from the DPW. The board adopted its regulations at the next meeting. It did remove the requirement that applicants file claims in court but left the county with the

147

Minutes, Indiana Department of Public Welfare, Box 1, April 24, 1940, 1042, Indiana State Archives. 148 Minutes, Indiana DPW, Box 1, December 1, 1940, 1151. 149 “Administrative Review of Public Assistance in Indiana,” May 31, 1943, 14–16. 150 Minutes, Indiana DPW, December 1, 1940, 1151.

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option to file a claim as directed under the 1936 Welfare Act.151 Enforcing family responsibility came at the expense of the needs of the applicant. These debates speak to the interactions of officials at different levels of government in these issues, and the cooperation and conflict those discussions generated in several states. Indiana legislators and officials did not welcome the commentary provided by federal officials, and were harshly critical of what they saw as federal intrusion on local and state authority. The state board of public welfare was more tempered in its view of SSA guidelines, and as noted earlier, was supportive of county authority, to some degree. The state board did require counties to investigate need, although counties retained some discretion on responsible relative investigations. It began to withhold reimbursements for grants from counties that violated state policies, although not for errors in family support. Counties that attempted to create standard grant amounts, regardless of the applicants’ financial situation, or those that did not accurately investigate applications, did not receive reimbursements for those cases.152 The practice became standard in 1938, when the board felt agencies had enough time to adapt to the new welfare law. One reason for the action was to ensure the state did not jeopardize its federal grant for the public assistance programs.153 Legislators and officials criticized the state DPW, and its professional social work philosophies, for fostering the federalization of public assistance, leading to the changes recommended by the Welfare Investigation Commission. Conflicts between federal officials and state officials over the authority of local officials in the investigation and granting of OAA were not unique to Indiana. Federal officials reported that “local officials in Maine are considered . . . as having more authoritative part in the application procedure than is provided by law.” Not all local officials sought to intervene, but those that did tended to be more punitive, according to case workers.154 Local officials took applications in some areas, rather than having applicants submit one at the local public assistance office. In some

151

Ibid., 1154. Examples of problems include not verifying the residence requirement, providing grants to children who did not live with eligible relatives, or approving grants to applicants in a public institution. Minutes, Indiana DPW, September 1, 1936, 97–98; October 16, 1936, 108. 153 Minutes, Indiana DPW, May 11, 1938, 506–507; September 14, 1938, 592–594. 154 “Maine – Official 2nd Annual Review, 10/1/41–9/30/42,” February 5, 1943, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maine, Box 43, Folder 620.62/03, 14, NA-CP. 152

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cases officials refused to accept an application or rejected an application with no consultation with case workers or supervisors in the local office.155 State officials resisted federal calls for less intervention by local officials, seeing it as a threat to local autonomy. This was due in part to the funding of public assistance. Local units (towns in Maine) contributed one-half of costs not covered by the federal government, resulting in significant influence with state legislators.156 The issue persisted throughout the 1940s, but seemed to wane somewhat with the passage of the 1947 laws strengthening enforcement of responsible relative provisions. A similar issue occurred in North Dakota, which funneled all applications through the local county welfare board, appointed by the county board of supervisors. County welfare boards often rejected the budgets presented by case workers. Federal officials questioned whether all who wished to have the opportunity to apply for aid, but also acknowledged the much larger problem was the lack of funds to provide grants for all in need. Pressure on county budgets likely prompted the actions by local officials.157 The concerns continued, although state officials minimized the frequency of these practices in a 1946 review. Federal officials noted that one staff member qualified the statement that the cases affected were few by noting that “they were usually developed with particular applicants as recipients in mind and were thus probably quite discriminatory in character.”158

property lien laws Efforts to limit public assistance costs extended to property lien and recovery laws in many states. States deployed these laws to discourage applications and to encourage family support as part of their enforcement of responsible relative laws. Proponents of such laws included business organizations, legislators, public assistance officials, and local officials. A significant proportion of OAA cases were closed because the recipient “Maine – First Annual Report of the Findings in the Administrative Review, 10/1/40–9/ 30/41,” SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maine, Box 43, Folder 620.62/03, 4, 19–20, NA-CP. 156 “Maine – Official 2nd Annual Review, 10/1/41–9/30/42,” 14–15. 157 “North Dakota – Official 1st Annual Report, 4/1/40–3/31/41,” 1, X-10 and X-11, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 620.62/03. 158 “North Dakota – Current Activity Report,” October 10, 1947, 2, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 620.62/03. 155

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died, and thus estate recovery was a logical mechanism to recover costs. These laws enabled counties or states to either place a lien on property as a condition of receiving public assistance or to seek recovery from a recipient’s assets or estate for assistance provided. Funds recovered would offset taxpayer funds spent on that support. Another goal was to ensure that costs were recovered before heirs, including adult children, could make claims on the estate. Both goals speak to efforts to limit the costs of public assistance by ensuring that family resources – in this case, the recipient’s assets – funded support for aging parents, even if this happened after the recipient’s death. While the recovery of funds was the primary goal, those advocating and enacting these provisions clearly sought to prevent heirs from inheriting property from parents they did not support.159 Many states also had time limits (usually two to five years) on when property could be transferred to another individual, such as an adult child, before an application for aid. This was to prevent the transfer of assets to avoid recovery and lien laws, or to qualify for aid by reducing the applicant’s real property.160 Responsible relative considerations were not the primary motivation for these provisions but did play a key role in the debates over lien laws. Indiana again offers an illustrative example as the state legislature eliminated its property lien law in 1941, and then reinstated it six years later. Indiana’s 1936 Welfare Act required applicants to sign a property lien on any real property to be eligible for OAA. Liens and recovery laws enabled county governments to make a claim against the recipient’s estate for any public assistance paid; any funds recovered were shared with the state and federal government. The legislature, in efforts to liberalize the law and ensure those in need were eligible, repealed the law in 1941.161 In effect, this changed the program, according to Public Welfare in Indiana, “from a ‘need-loan’ basis to a ‘need-grant’ basis.”162 Caseloads increased in the next two years, including 7,420 cases in the first year.163 159

Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 120, 166. Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 116–117, 151–152. 161 The state senate vote to repeal the property lien law on a 25–17 vote, and the state house voted for repeal on a 77–10. Indiana State Senate, Journal of the Indiana State Senate during the Regular Session of the Eighty-Second Session of the General Assembly (Fort Wayne, IN: Fort Wayne Printing Company, 1941): 1152; Journal of the House of Representatives of the State of Indiana, Eighty-Second Session of the General Assembly (Indianapolis, IN: Bookwalter-Ball-Greathouse Printing Co., 1941): 1103. 162 “New Rules for Old Age Assistance,” Public Welfare in Indiana. 51.5 (1941): 3. 163 State of Indiana, Annual Report of the Department of Public Welfare and the Divisions of Supervision of State Institutions for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1941 (Indianapolis, 160

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The Indiana legislature reinstated the property lien law in 1947 despite opposition from the state welfare board, and the target was adult children who were perceived to be avoiding their responsibility to support aging parents.164 Restoring the lien was one of the recommendations of Indiana’s Welfare Investigation Commission. County boards also urged reinstatement of the law, as did the county welfare directors’ association and the Indiana Chamber of Commerce.165 The commission report noted that the only group that benefited from the recovery law’s repeal were the heirs of OAA recipients and argued that “no other feature of the present welfare program has caused such wide dissatisfaction.”166 In its analysis of the lien law after its reinstatement, the Indiana Chamber of Commerce argued that the restoration of the law was “good government, good politics, good case work, and does not deprive a single aged person of assistance to which he is entitled legally. It merely prevents the heirs who did not support their aged relative from receiving a ‘bonus’ at the expense of the taxpayers.”167 One state senator argued that “The whole point of this lien provision is to prevent leaving estates of these elderly people to someone who does not deserve them.”168 Public Welfare in Indiana, in bold print, wrote that “The greatest value of the 1947 lien and recovery amendment of The Welfare Act is the deterrent effect upon persons who are not actually in need. . . . Children who are financially able to support their needy aged parent or parents make a real effort to meet their legal obligation when they realized that any amount paid from public funds comes out of any property left by the deceased recipient.”169 For those IN: The Department of Public Welfare, 1941): 289; State of Indiana, Annual Report for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1942, 725; John V. Barnett, Recovery of Public Funds in Old-Age Assistance (Indiana State Chamber of Commerce, 1950): 5. 164 “Welfare Lien and Recovery of Old Age Assistance,” Public Welfare in Indiana. 57.5 (1947): 6–7. The state board minutes recorded no statements concerning the property lien laws. 165 “Current Activities Report – December 1, 1946 to February 28, 1947,” March 4, 1947, 9, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Indiana, Box 32, Folder 623.1/03; Survey of county welfare directors, 1944, County Welfare Directors’ Association, Folder Indiana Association of County Directors, 1942–1961, 4, Indiana Public Welfare Records, Box 1, Indiana State Library. 166 “Action on Recommendations of the Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission,” Public Welfare in Indiana. 58.8 (1948): 12; Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, Official Report of the Indiana Welfare Investigation Commission, 14. 167 Emphasis in original text. Barnett, Recovery of Public Funds, 4. 168 “Old Age Lien Passes Senate,” Indianapolis Star. February 26, 1947, 17. 169 “Old Age Assistance Lien and Recovery Provision,” Public Welfare in Indiana. 58.8 (1948): 5. South Dakota’s department of public welfare also supported the lien

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who wished to inherit the parents’ property, keeping the property free from debt encouraged support.170 South Dakota’s Department of Social Security recognized that some children did not support their parents “maybe through no fault of their own,” but then they “desire what little property there may be remaining” after the death of the parent. Ultimately recovered funds “when turned back to the State [are] again used to care for some other needy aged person.”171 Concern with the increasing costs of OAS in California prompted efforts to restore a property lien law in the state as a way to reduce public expenditures. Just six states, including California, had responsible relative laws but no recovery or lien law.172 California voters eliminated the property lien law in 1940 via a Constitutional amendment, largely through the efforts of pension groups, and legislators attempted more than once to reinstate the law, with no success.173 Key opponents of the repeal included the CTA who argued that the repeal “would merely help [recipients’] heirs who would inherit such property although during the lifetime of their parents they refused to assist them and shifted this responsibility to the hard-pressed taxpayers.”174 A 1953 California senate report on social welfare programs recommended such a law, arguing that “the taxpayer should not be expected to help provide these benefits to the aged recipient whose estate at his death will go to relatives who did not assume the responsibility for furnishing the necessities of life to the recipient.”175 The report’s authors argued that public assistance grants were helping recipients retain their property but “upon the death of these recipients, the children who have made no contribution to their needy parents’ support inherit the property.” The report recommended a new law that would enable recipients and their spouses to remain in their provisions as a deterrent on applications. South Dakota Department of Social Security Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1939 to June 30, 1940 (Pierre, SD, 1940): 9. 170 Bond, Our Needy Aged, 166. 171 South Dakota Department of Social Security, Annual Report for the Period July 1, 1939 to June 30, 1940 (1940): 9. 172 Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 166. Other states were Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, and Mississippi. 173 “Liens, Claims on Estates, etc.” January 10, 1966, Department of Social Welfare Records, Coded Files, R350.130 Box 176, Folder 27, 1, CSA; California Department of Social Welfare, Biennial Report, 1938–1940, 22; Jackson K. Putnam, Old Age Politics in California: From Richardson to Reagan (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1970): 123–124. 174 “Ballot Recommendations,” The Tax Digest. 18.10 (1940): 329. 175 Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare: Part Five (Sacramento, CA: California Senate, 1951): 25.

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homes during their lifetime, but provide for recovery of assistance by the state and counties.176 The same report found that states with both responsible relative and recovery provisions had the lowest recipient rate among the aged population in the state.177 The CTA recommended a lien and recovery law to the legislature on more than one occasion, using arguments similar to the senate report.178 The 1954 study by Floyd Bond and several coauthors analyzing California’s aging population and the programs that served them argued for a recovery provision, pointing to other states that reduced costs and caseloads with such means.179 While proponents of lien laws argued that such laws encouraged families to provide support if they wished to inherit property, opponents positioned such laws as stealing the homes of the aged. Efforts to pass a lien law in California continued in the 1960s, and the California League of Senior Citizens (formerly the California Institute of Social Welfare and the CCOAP) was a key opponent.180 Coverage in its newsletter, Senior Citizens Sentinel, described these laws as “the wretched practice of taking liens on the little homes of Old Age Pensioners.”181 Liens were “vicious” and represented the “theft of assets and property of the Needy Elderly.”182 A 1969 article called the proposed lien law a “new attempt to pick bones of poor,” and argued that such laws took the recipient’s “only asset of any value.” Home ownership saved the state money, as otherwise recipients would be paying rent rather than living in their own home, increasing their budget and grant. “However such logic is entirely overlooked by politicians who prefer to serve the greedy rather than the needy.”183 Proponents of lien laws efforts were described as “hate the needy” groups or hate cults.

176

Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare: Needed Revisions in Social Welfare Legislation (Sacramento, CA: California Senate, 1951): 29–30. 177 Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare: Part Five, 25; Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 259. 178 “Improving Public Assistance I: Property Lien and Recovery Provisions.” The Tax Digest. 31.8 (1953): 267–268; “Can Aid to Needy Be ‘Recovered’ Provisions in State Laws Enacted.” The Tax Digest. 32.5 (1954): 157. 179 Bond et al., The Needy Aged, 355–357. 180 The CISW changed its name to the California League of Senior Citizens by membership vote in 1962. “It’s the California League of Senior Citizens!” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 20.5 (1962): 7. Chapter 2 in Bond et al., The Needy Aged, details this organization’s role more fully. 181 “The County Would Grab Your Home,” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 23.3 (1965): 2. 182 “Vicious State Lien Bill Blocked by Lobby,” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 24.5 (1966): 1. 183 “Bad Bill: New Attempt to Pick Bones of Poor,” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 27.5 (1969): 1.

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The arguments regarding lien laws intersected with ideas about who had primary responsibility to ensure economic security for the needy elderly: the government via taxpayer funds or family members. The CCOAP, and its leader, George McLain, were silent on who did benefit from the lack of a lien law: the heirs, likely adult children, who inherited the property of OAS recipients. The CTA argued in 1948 that if financially able, families carried the “primary responsibility” for support of family members, while taxpayers were decidedly second: “A citizen is legally, morally, and logically more liable for the support of his own parents than are the other citizens.” Public funds should support those in need, the journal argued, “but only after the primary responsibility has been discharged.”184 Proponents of lien laws argued that such a practice rewarded children who did not fulfill their obligation to their parents. California Governor Ronald Reagan attempted to enact a recovery and lien provision in 1969 with no success, again arguing that it was “inequitable for the taxpayer to support a recipient whose estate is subsequently divided among the relatives who did not support the recipient.”185 The push for recovery and lien provisions was a national trend, with several states either strengthening their laws, or enacting new recovery laws, in an attempt to control escalating public assistance costs in the late 1940s and 1950s. Like responsible relative laws, the SSA discouraged such provisions as a condition of eligibility. In 1935, twenty-six states allowed recovery of general relief funds from recipients’ estates, and all but five states had some type of recovery law (either recovery from the deceased estate, property lien law, or recovery from property acquired) for OAA recipients.186 Thirty-three states had recovery laws by 1946.187 Washington enacted its recovery law in OAA in 1947. Two subsequent ballot initiatives eliminated the lien law in 1948 (Initiative 172) and then reversed it two years later in 1950 (Initiative 178).188 Utah enacted a lien law in 1948, and Tennessee “Ballot Recommendations: Factual Analysis of Six Propositions,” The Tax Digest. 26.7 (1948): 313. 185 Memo from the Office of the Governor to Members of the Legislature, May 5, 1969, 2, Box 56, Folder 28, Social Welfare Director Files, Public Assistance General, CSA. 186 Lowe, State Public Welfare Legislation, 63–67, 92–95. 187 Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 165. 188 Jules H. Berman, “Legislative Changes in Public Assistance,” Social Security Bulletin. 10.11 (1947): 10; Allen Yarnell, “Pension Politics in Washington State, 1948,” The Pacific Northwest Quarterly. 61.3 (1970): 154; Biennial Report of the Washington State Department of Public Welfare for the Period Beginning October 1, 1946 and Ending September 30, 1948 (Olympia, WA: 1949): 64. 184

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passed its first recovery law in 1949.189 Michigan’s Recovery Act of 1947 was part of the state legislators’ hostility toward public assistance programs described earlier. Federal officials called the law a compromise stemming from “considerable pressure during the last legislative session for mandatory recovery including the taking of liens against the property of recipients of old-age assistance.”190 Georgia passed a recovery law in 1951, at the same time it enacted its Relative Support Law.191 Idaho legislators enacted a lien law in 1951, and state welfare administrators reported that “In July 1951, the month in which the lien law became effective, 1261 recipients voluntarily withdraw from the rolls rather than execute the lien agreement.”192 Utah administrators reported that they also saw a decline in the caseload after its lien provision was enacted in 1958, but also saw the expansion of OASDI as another reason, as did other states, for declines in caseloads and applications.193 Just nine states had neither responsible relative nor recovery laws, while seven states had a recovery law but no responsible relative law in 1953 (see Map 1.2). By 1954 thirty-three states had some type of recovery law.194 State laws varied on the prioritization of the state’s claim against the property in comparison to other creditors, but most required reimbursement for any assistance paid.195 Deterring applications, while also encouraging support from children, with the result of lower caseloads and public assistance costs, was a key

“Current Activity Report,” November 4, 1948, 4, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Utah, Box 98, Folder 620.62/03; Berman, “State Public Assistance Legislation, 1949,” 8. 190 “Current Activities Report – Michigan,” October 28, 1947, 8, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 620.62/03. 191 Georgia Department of Welfare, Official Report for the Fiscal Year July 1, 1950 to June 30, 1951 (1951), 9; Georgia Department of Welfare, Official Report for the Fiscal Year July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952 (1952), 9–11; Public Act No. 444, Acts and Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of Georgia, 1951, 691–692; Public Act 297, Acts and Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of Georgia, 1951, 466–467. 192 193 Nelson et al., “Relative Responsibility,” 68. Ibid., 68–69. 194 Bond et al., The Needy Aged, 165–166 (states with recovery laws but no responsible relative law included Arizona, Idaho, Kansas, North Carolina, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming); Jules H. Berman, “Legislative Changes in Public Assistance 1947,” Social Security Bulletin. 10.11 (1947): 10–11; Jules H. Berman, “State Public Assistance Legislation 1951.” Social Security Bulletin. 14.12 (1951): 8; “State Public Assistance Legislation 1959.” Social Security Bulletin. 23.2 (1960): 26. 195 Bond et al., Our Needy Aged, 166–169. Most states would not seek a claim against the estate if the recipient left a surviving spouse or dependent children who resided in the home. 189

Washington Montana Oregon

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Texas Louisiana GeoData Source: GADM. Map Author: Kasey Wilson, MSU Map Library.

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Figure 1.2 – 1953 Recovery and responsible relative laws Responsible relative laws but no recovery laws Recovery laws but no responsible relative laws Neither responsible relative or recovery laws

map 1.2 Recovery and responsible relative laws by state in 1954

Rhode Island Connecticut New Jersey Delaware Maryland

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goal of such laws. According to Indiana officials, reinstating the property law not only generated funds via recovery from estates for assistance paid (totaling nearly $14,000 in December 1947) but also significantly reduced the caseload: officials attributed the 10 percent decline in the caseload to the reinstatement of the lien law. The decline remained steady in the following months, saving $115,000 in funds in one month.196 The Indiana Chamber of Commerce estimated that the total savings in 1948–1949 would be more than $4 million as a result of recipients who would withdraw from the program, applicants who refused to sign a property lien, and recoveries from estates.197 Other states saw similar declines in caseloads. The state of Washington’s OAA caseloads also decreased significantly in 1947 after the legislature enacted its lien law in the OAA program; case closures more than doubled when the law first passed, from 731 to 1477.198 After Michigan’s legislature passed its Recovery Act in 1947, closures of OAA cases doubled by early 1948; welfare department officials attributed the decline in caseloads (about 3 percent, or nearly 3,000 cases) to the 1947 law.199 Decreases occurred in fifty-four of the state’s eighty-three counties.200 Georgia’s OAA caseloads declined by 6.8 percent in the year immediately following the passage of the 1951 Relative Support Law and recovery law, and welfare department officials attributed the decline to the more stringent laws.201 The law generated significant complaints to the governor’s office, according to federal officials, but few doubted the law was responsible for the significant decline in caseloads.202 Responsible relative laws in their varied forms represented a key site of resistance by state legislators and officials to federal regulation of public 196 197 198

“Old Age Assistance Lien and Recovery Provision,” 5. Barnett, Recovery of Public Funds in Old-Age Assistance, 6–7.

Biennial Report of the Washington State Department of Public Welfare for the Period Beginning October 1, 1946 and Ending September 30, 1948 (Olympia, WA: 1949): 64–65; Helping People Help Themselves: Biennial Report, October 1, 1948 to September 30, 1950 of the State Department of Social Security (Olympia, WA): 20–21. 199 Public Act 262 of 1947, Local and Public Acts of the Michigan Legislature, 394; Michigan Social Welfare Commission, Fifth Biennial Report, July 1946 to June 1948 (Lansing, MI: Michigan Social Welfare Commission, 1948): 17, 20. 200 Michigan Social Welfare Commission Michigan Welfare Review. 5. 1 (July–December 1947): 14–15. 201 Georgia. Department of Public Welfare. Official Report for the fiscal year July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952, 9. 202 “Current Activities Report – Michigan,” April 29, 1948, 6, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 623.1, NA-CP.

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assistance. Motivated in part by a desire to protect state and local authority over assistance, such laws also were driven by the rising costs of OAA. The strengthening of responsible relative laws and property lien and recovery laws were part of a larger backlash in the states to the rising costs of public assistance and to federal regulations seeking to reshape state and local policies on relief administration. For OAA recipients this primarily took the form of enforcing support by family members, particularly adult children. This chapter has focused on state and local resistance to federal requirements and policies, but the next chapter turns to recipients. Recipients and advocacy organizations challenged the rulings of local and state departments of public welfare through fair hearings and the courts. An early manifestation of welfare rights activism, these efforts demonstrate that recipients and their families would not let support enforcement go unchallenged.

2 “This Responsible Relative Racket” Contesting Family Support Obligations

Mrs. R. H. Gilman, a recipient of Old Age Security (OAS), wrote to California’s Republican Governor Earl Warren in December 1943, asking that the program’s requirement that adult children provide support to parents receiving OAS benefits be repealed. The Oakland resident wrote that she “[made] this appeal from the depths of our own experience.” She and her husband applied for OAS during the Great Depression, and “the besetting worry of all was that item in the law.” The war brought more employment opportunities for her son, but “he needed all he could earn, and the fear haunted us all the time that the State might force him to care for us in addition to his own family.” The parents’ only option, according to Gilman, was to leave the state, which would place her son outside the reach of the responsible relative laws. Then her husband, who was 73, gained employment in the shipyards, enabling them to leave the OAS program. “You can see how the present Old Age Law would reach out to the second generation and farther,” she wrote to Warren, asking that he demand changes in the law.1 Mrs. Gilman wrote her letter during deliberations by the Governor’s Citizens’ Statewide Committee on Old Age Pensions, created to analyze and recommend revisions to the OAS program. California legislators created the program under the 1935 Social Security Act, but named it OAS rather than Old Age Assistance (OAA) as most states did.2 Criticisms of the responsible

1

Letter to Governor Earl Warren from Mrs. R. H. Gilman, Oakland California, 1943, Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare – Pensions file (CCOAP), Folder 4030, April–December 1943, California State Archives (hereafter cited as CSA), Sacramento, CA. 2 I use OAS when addressing the California program, and OAA when addressing the federal provisions that transcend state administration.

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relative provisions came from many groups, and correspondence to the social welfare department and elected officials offers a window into the critiques of the laws. These critiques echoed those presented by pension organizations in the state from the 1930s to the 1960s. George McLain, head of the Citizens Committee for Old Age Pensions (CCOAP), which was renamed the California Institute for Social Welfare by 1950, referred to “this responsible relative racket” in his comments to the state social welfare board in 1942.3 This chapter analyzes resistance to responsible relative laws by both activist groups and individuals. This resistance came in the form of organized opposition by pension organizations, particularly California’s CCOAP and the Washington Pension Union (WPU), but OAA recipients and their families contested support obligations across the country as well. Protests directed at responsible relative laws – both family support obligations and recovery and property lien regulations – included letters written to California committees investigating aid for the aged and legislators to appearances at state social welfare board meetings. Recipients and applicants in several states also deployed the fair hearing process to protest agency decisions, and if that proved unsuccessful, turned to the courts where available. Pension organizations successfully eliminated responsible relative provisions in both California and Washington, although these efforts were quickly reversed in California. But their advocacy did promote higher benefits and achieve some administrative changes in support requirements; California’s old age benefits were among the highest in the nation. This resistance countered groups described in Chapter 1 who defended and promoted the expansion of responsible relative laws as a means of fiscal control. As organizations such as the CCOAP and the WPU pushed for higher benefits for the aged, business, employer, and taxpayer groups in both states fought attempts to liberalize eligibility and benefits. Both sides deployed arguments about government intrusion and overreach. Opponents’ demands ranged from higher grants to administrative changes to outright repeal of these laws. Rather than positioning these benefits as a burden on taxpayers who funded the benefits, opponents instead framed benefits as a right of citizenship after years of labor, parenting, and paying taxes themselves. Part of these debates hinged on who was a legitimate taxpayer and what the rewards of paying taxes should be. Fair hearings and court challenges show that recipients contested agency decisions regarding relatives’ support and intent regarding property transfers. Both offered claimants space to voice 3

California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 3, Folder 60, December 17, 1942, 111; Department of Social Welfare, Records of the State Social Welfare Board, CSA.

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their narrative of events. Depending on state policies, claimants at times successfully reversed decisions regarding OAA eligibility.

an early welfare rights movement The CCOAP, headed by George McLain, focused primarily on reforming the OAS program and addressing the needs of its recipients. He claimed 68,000 members in 1952, and all but 5,000 were OAS recipients; those who were not current recipients would likely apply when they reached the required age of sixty-five.4 The organization is generally analyzed as part of the pension movement of the period, but it more accurately represents an early effort to organize public assistance recipients as a political force.5 Scholars generally situate the beginning of the welfare rights movement in the 1960s, when Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) recipients created the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) to ensure fair and equitable treatment and to protest an intrusive welfare bureaucracy in the program’s administration. Both the NWRO and the CCOAP criticized bureaucrats administering the programs, intrusive investigations by case workers, and inadequate benefits. Organizers framed public assistance as a right of citizenship. The NWRO advised recipients on AFDC applications and regulations, as well as how to appeal decisions.6 The CCOAP, although very different in structure and context, articulated similar goals for California’s OAS recipients.7 The organization, which outnumbered the NWRO at its peak in the early 1950s, evolved in purpose and name throughout the post-World War II period but remained a force in OAS politics well into the 1970s. Its key focus was 4

Frank A. Pinner, Paul Jacobs, and Philip Selznick, Old Age and Political Behavior (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1959): 57, 109. 5 Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward identify the unemployment organizations of the Great Depression, as well as the labor and civil rights movements, as early efforts by economically disenfranchised groups to mobilize. See Piven and Cloward, Poor People’s Movements: Why They Succeed, How They Fail (New York: Knopf Doubleday, 1978). 6 On the National Welfare Rights Organization, see Felicia Kornbluh, The Battle for Welfare Rights: Politics and Poverty in Modern America (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007); Premilla Nadasen, Welfare Warriors: The Welfare Rights Movement in the United States (New York: Routledge, 2004); Frances Fox Piven and Richard A. Cloward, Regulating the Poor: The Functions of Public Welfare (New York: Vintage Books, 1993); and Annelise Orleck, Storming Caesar’s Palace: How Black Mothers Fought Their Own War on Poverty (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2005). 7 Piven and Cloward estimate that the NWRO had 22,000 members nationally at its peak in 1969; Kornbluh argues it was between 20,000 and 30,000. Piven and Cloward, Poor People’s Movements, 295; Kornbluh, The Battle for Welfare Rights, 2.

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asserting and protecting the rights of OAS recipients.8 The pursuit of fair hearings and court challenges, at times with the encouragement of pension advocacy groups, prompts a rethinking of the timeline of welfare rights organizations. Fair hearings and court challenges – key tools in the movements of the1960s – were deployed in the post-Social Security era. Felicia Kornbluh argues that analysis of the National Federation for the Blind (NFB), which advocated for the rights of blind people more broadly in the 1940s and 1950s, also prompts reconsideration of the larger rights movements of the 1960s as well as those advocating disability rights. Although the NFB, the California Council for the Blind (CCB), and the CCOAP criticized means-tested public assistance programs, including the responsible relative laws, they disagreed on how to improve the system.9 The NFB’s and the CCB’s efforts centered on expanding the Aid to the Blind’s (AB) provisions for rehabilitation and employment as a path to independence. Public assistance was perceived as secondary and temporary. A right to public assistance was not the organizations’ focus.10 Blind activists and those advocating for the elderly in OAA rarely collaborated, in California or nationally, although they critiqued public assistance for different reasons.11 The two groups took opposite sides on California’s Proposition 4 in 1948 and its repeal in 1949; they traded vigorous attacks during both campaigns, but particularly in 1949. The CCB, which led the effort for repeal, argued that Proposition 4 harmed blind people’s efforts to gain independence via economic opportunity, “scrambl[ing] and confus[ing] aid for the blind with aid for the aged,” thus undermining the work of blind organizations over the previous thirty years. The organizations’ efforts to distance blind people from public assistance were a key source of conflict between the two constituencies.12 The NFB and the CCOAP situate the 8

The California Institute of Social Welfare (formerly the CCOAP) also fought restrictive laws targeting AFDC, but with little success. Ellen Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers: Past and Present (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005): 95–96. 9 Jacobus tenBroek was president of the NFB, executive vice president of the California Council for the Blind (CCB), and also served on California’s Social Welfare Board from 1950 to 1963; in his work as NFB president he was a harsh critic of the means test and the Aid to the Blind program. See Jacobus tenBroek, Hope Deferred: Public Welfare and the Blind (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1959). 10 Felicia Kornbluh, “Disability, Antiprofessionalism, and Civil Rights: The National Federation of the Blind and the ‘Right to Organize’ in the 1950s.” Journal of American History. 97.4 (2011): 1024–1026, 1031, 1041. 11 Ibid., 1031. 12 The Blind Can See: What the Blind Think of the McLain Pension Measure: A Report to the People of California (California Council for the Blind, 1949): 1, 5, 11–12; Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare Prop 4, Box 2, Folder 4013, CSA. The

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organizational critique of public assistance programs at least two decades before the rise of the NWRO in the 1960s. Despite the lack of formal collaboration and the intense conflict over Proposition 4 in California, the NFB, CCB, CCOAP, and later the NWRO, all critiqued the financial means test in public assistance and specific eligibility requirements, including the responsibility of relatives to provide support. The CCOAP, the NFB, and the CCB viewed relatives’ responsibility as an impediment to independence rather than a means to secure more support for recipients.13 The numerous pension movements across the country in the 1930s and 1940s also fostered the idea that OAA was – or should be – a pension and thus a right. In the 1930s and 1940s, the movements in various forms argued for a flat pension for all senior citizens, and California was the site of several drives to create a uniform pension for all aging Americans. The Townsend Plan was perhaps the most well-known, and spread nationally, but others fueled the idea of a pension as an earned right of the aged.14 Rejection of the means test in OAA was a consistent theme in many organizations. Pressure from a proposed initiative by the Fraternal Order of Eagles, a pension organization, prompted the Nevada legislature to amend its OAA law in 1943, eliminating responsible relative requirements and raising the minimum OAA grant from $30 to $40.15 The WPU sponsored Initiative 172 in 1948 seeking to repeal restrictive legislation passed the previous year; that law had reduced minimum grants and instituted a property lien provision. The Initiative, which called for a $60 minimum monthly grant and elimination of both responsible

Council for the Blind also shared the critique of the pension organization as one committed to leaders’ self-interest, rather than those of its members. It also argued that the Proposition harmed public assistance administration for both the aged and the blind. 13 tenBroek saw federal oversight in the public assistance programs, which limited the rights of states, as a key problem with those programs. His discussion of responsible relative laws faults federal officials for fostering the spread of those laws by their requirement that all income be considered in determining grants. tenBroek, Hope Deferred, particularly chapters 5 and 6. For responsible relative provisions, see 70–72, and 140–141. 14 Daniel J. B. Mitchell, “The Lesson of Ham and Eggs: California’s 1938 and 1939 Pension Ballot Propositions,” Southern California Quarterly. 82.2 (Summer 2000): 193–218; Daniel J. B. Mitchell, Pensions, Politics and the Elderly (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 2000), particularly chapter 2; Edwin Amenta, Neal Caren, and Sheera Joy Olasky, “Age for Leisure? Political Mediation and the Impact of the Pension Movement on U.S. Old-Age Policy.” American Sociological Review. 70.3 (2005): 516–538. 15 The initiative passed in 1944, but resulted in few changes due to the earlier legislative action. “Current Activity Report for the Period August 1, 1944 to September 30, 1944,” 4–7; Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Correspondence, Nevada, Box 63, Folder 623.1, NA-CP.

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relative support laws and the property lien provision, passed with 54 percent of votes cast on the initiative.16 The Indiana Chamber of Commerce identified the state’s lack of an organized pension movement as a key reason for the state’s legislative record in enforcing support obligations, particularly for recovery laws: “The Indiana experience also has demonstrated that the unpopularity and political onus supposedly accompanying this type of legislation are almost entirely the creation of professional pension promoters. The absence of a highly organized ‘pension group’ in this state appears to indicate acceptance of the fairness of the Indiana law by the aged persons receiving assistance under its provisions.”17 The Indiana Chamber of Commerce’s efforts to promote responsible relative provisions as a means of fiscal control were far more successful than the California Taxpayers Association (CTA), in part because Indiana lacked the powerful pension organizations found in California or the broad support for more generous public benefits. Many pension organizations of the 1930s and 1940s, including the Townsend Plan and the Ham and Eggs proposal, sought benefits for all elderly, regardless of need; the CCOAP, although it deployed pension rhetoric, did not seek a universal pension. Economic security for the aged in need was its primary goal, and thus the organization sought to reform OAS and specifically targeted program recipients for membership. It fought for increased benefits and sought change in how applicants were investigated and treated, criticizing what members saw as an intrusive state bureaucracy infringing on their rights as Americans and citizens.18 The CCOAP’s successful 1948 referendum eliminated some of the most criticized provisions of the OAS law, including responsible relative laws, while ensuring that funds for the program were prioritized in the state budget. While responsible relative laws were not the primary focus of the CCOAP’s opposition, the elimination of those requirements was 16

A $60 grant is $751 in 2022 dollars. Washington’s legislature and DSW were consistent in their opposition to a responsible relative law, beyond requiring parents to support minor children. “Current Activities Report, November 10, 1948,” 2–4, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Correspondence, Washington, Box 104, Folder 632.1/03, NA-CP; Allen Yarnell, “Pension Politics in Washington State, 1948.” The Pacific Northwest Quarterly. 61.3 (1970): 147, 154. The WTA also spoke out against the initiatives, warning of the increased costs. “Initiative Measure No. 172,” The Washington Taxpayer. 11.3 (1948): 2; “State Facing $200 Million in New Tax Demands,” The Washington Taxpayer. 11.4 (1948): 1–3. 17 John V. Barnett, Recovery of Public Funds in Old Age Assistance (Indiana State Chamber of Commerce, 1950): 8. 18 Pinner et al., Old Age and Political Behavior, 21.

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a recurring goal. McLain led the drive to pass Proposal 4 in 1948, which restructured the state’s OAS program. The proposal was reversed a year later, and was the only successful effort, although short-lived, to repeal California’s responsible relative laws until 1975.19 A key contrast between the CCOAP and the later welfare rights movement was organizational structure. McLain appealed to public assistance recipients with promises of economic security and fair treatment, but the organization was not democratic in structure and members played a minimal role in planning or mobilizing strategy. Members paid annual dues of $5 in 1954; those increased to $10 five years later.20 In return, members received the organization’s publication, Welfare Advocate and, like the NWRO in the 1960s, were eligible for counseling services in the application and appeals process, either regarding eligibility or the size of the grant awarded.21 Members had no voting rights or say in how the organization functioned. Authors of a 1959 study of the organization argued that members were “like customers devoted to a product and will buy it faithfully but have no independent role.”22 The NWRO, in contrast, was built on the activism and leadership of recipients, who played key roles in shaping the movement’s agenda and strategies. Assessments of the varied pension organizations criticize most of the pension proposals as utopian plans underscored by unsound economic principles, but opponents of the CCOAP argued that the organizations preyed upon the needy elderly, exploiting their limited resources for support. Floyd Bond and his coauthors in their extensive 1954 study of California’s elderly poor referred to most of the pension plans as “schemes.”23 A 1950 article in The Tax Digest argued that “no state has been so well organized and exploited by pension promoters and their followers as has California.”24 Assessments of McLain’s organization faulted the lack of democratic structure and what some saw as exploitation of the elderly with frequent calls for donations and demands Susan Stein-Roggenbuck, “‘This Responsible Relative Racket’: The Persistence of Family Support Obligations in California.” Social Service Review. 91.4 (2017): 654, 675–676. 20 Dues in 2022 dollars would be $55 and $102, respectively. Life memberships were $75 in 1954 and $100 ten years later – or $826 and $1,021 in 2022 dollars. 21 22 Pinner et al., Old Age and Political Behavior, 154–156. Ibid., 113, quote on 109. 23 Floyd A. Bond, Ray E. Baber, John A. Vieg, et al. Our Needy Aged: A California Study of a National Problem (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1954): chapter 3, “Pensions, Politics and Pressure Groups.” See also Jackson K. Putnam, Old-Age Politics in California: From Richardson to Reagan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1970). 24 Charles G. Hanson, “Relief across the Nation: California – the ‘Sucker’ State.” The Tax Digest. 28.4 (1950): 138. Hanson was a legislative correspondent with the LA Times. 19

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for dues. Recipients of OAS had no extra funds, and critics argued that McLain was taking from those with nothing to give and providing little in return. A 1951 California Senate report on the state’s pension organizations argued that followers at times “deprive themselves in many instances of the necessities of life to contribute dues to these pension plans. These plans have taken considerable money from the senior citizens and nothing has been accomplished other than that those dissatisfied with one plan follow the leader to another new organization.”25 The report also found that the CCOAP was a major client of McLain’s advertising agency, and argued that donations were the chief source of income for both McLain and his business, a practice shared by other pension organizations.26 Advocacy groups for OAA recipients, regardless of how others perceived them, shaped debates over benefits and administrative practices. California was one of many states that employed responsible relative laws in its public assistance administration, but the role of pension organizations, particularly one dedicated to public assistance recipients, in shaping the OAS program was unique. Advocacy groups such as the CCOAP help explain the contradiction inherent in California as a case study: The state’s OAS benefits were among the highest in the country but it was also among the most persistent in its enforcement of responsible relative laws. Fiscal concerns, despite the efforts of the CCOAP, fostered legislators’ dedication to family support until responsible relative laws were finally eliminated in 1975. Fiscal control was also evident in Indiana’s commitment to family support, but pension organizations could not muster support – likely due to the widespread commitment to home rule and fiscal conservatism – to shape OAA as the CCOAP did with OAS in California.

pensions or public assistance? The belief that OAA was a pension, a benefit earned through either a lifetime of paying taxes on the part of the aged parent or by children who were contributing to the Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) program through payroll taxes, emerged in the enforcement of responsible relative laws. Some recipients and their children believed the payroll taxes 25

Senate of the State of California, Report of the Senate Interim Committee on Social Welfare, Part One: State Department of Social Welfare under Article XXV: A Historical Biography of California’s Pension Organizations (Sacramento, CA: 1951): 59. 26 Senate of the State of California, Report, Part One, 138. For an assessment of the senate hearings and report, see Pinner et al., Old Age and Political Behavior, 46–48; Mitchell, Pensions, Politics and the Elderly, 141–142.

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collected for OASI funded OAA; they rejected the idea that eligibility for OAA required proof of need. OAA was consistently referred to as an “old age pension,” causing further confusion. As noted in the book’s introduction, far more people received OAA benefits rather than OASI in the 1930s and 1940s, contributing to the confusion over what was assistance and what was an earned benefit. Michigan officials reported that many complaints from children about the responsible relative requirements reflected misconceptions about OAA: “To many children, as to many recipients, old age assistance is a ‘pension’ and is considered a reward for having paid taxes and having been a good citizen.”27 Confusion over payroll taxes paid into the OASI program fueled the idea that the benefits were earned. Public assistance workers and officials often sought to clarify that payroll taxes funded the OASI program, which was a contributory program, but not OAS. One daughter inquired about the requirement to support in 1943; in a reply, California public assistance officials noted that “since Social Security taxes are being paid, you do not understand why it is necessary for aged persons to depend on their children for support.” The daughter assumed that payroll taxes were funding the OAA program. Officials enclosed information explaining the difference between the social insurance program and the public assistance program.28 Federal officials sought to reshape the poor relief system into a more modern welfare program, but emphasized that such aid was based on need.29 An article published in 1940 in Public Welfare in Indiana sought to clarify the difference between the public assistance programs and other contributory programs: “Let us look at a definition of the misunderstood term in order to justify the flat statement that the word ‘pensions’, as used in this instance, is a misnomer.”30 In a more extreme example, in the 1940s Maryland case workers rejected an application outright if an individual requested “a ‘pension’ rather than . . . public assistance.”31 “State Bureau of Social Security: OAA, ADC and AB Correspondence,” April 1 to October 1, 1943, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Correspondence, Michigan, Box 50, Folder 600, NA-CP. 28 Letter to Mrs. Estilla Kunkel of Los Angeles, April 30, 1943; Folder 3941, Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files; see also Letter to Mr. J. A. Essex dated April 15, 1943, 1, CSA. 29 Blanche D. Coll, Safety Net: Welfare and Social Security, 1929–1979 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1995): 83. 30 “Pensions or Old Age Assistance?” Public Welfare in Indiana. 50.12 (1940): 11. 31 “Maryland – Fifth Annual Report of the Review of Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1944–1945,” 8; Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maryland, Box 45, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 27

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The CTA agreed that the original 1929 Old Age Security Act was viewed as a pension and criticized the program as “state participation in county charities.”32 Because of this perception that OAS “is a form of pension that aged persons are entitled to whether they need it or not,” the CTA argued, people were seeking aid who did not truly need it.33 The trend to see public assistance aid as a pension only increased, the organization argued, as the Depression continued.34 By 1953 the CTA listed the “pension concept” as one reason for the escalating costs of OAS.35 Floyd Bond argued in 1955 that the program’s name be changed to OAA, “since California is the only State in which the true nature of the noncontributory OAA program is camouflaged with the ambiguous title, ‘Old Age Security.’”36 Proponents of the view that OAA should be a pension rejected any needs-based investigation because the elderly had earned the benefits. McLain argued in 1943 that the “responsible relative racket” was “one of the most un-American laws . . . in the State of California.” If this obligation was placed on old age “pension” recipients, in McLain’s view, it should be required of all who receive a public pension, including firefighters, police, and civil service employees.37 Lorraine Barry spoke at a hearing held by the Governor’s Committee on old age pensions, arguing that “a mother who bore children was as much entitled to a pension as the teacher who taught them.”38 Critics of responsible relative laws argued that enforcement of responsible relative laws fostered the dependence of elderly parents – countering any independence that OAA could provide. Parents were forced to “beg” from children who could not afford to provide support, or who believed that doing so meant sacrificing needs for their own families. Pension John M. Pierce, “State Aid to Needy Aged: Financial Aspects of Old Age Security Act.” The Tax Digest. 9.12 (1931): 419. 33 Pierce, “State Aid to Needy Aged,” 420. 34 L. D. Gifford, “Relief and Taxes: Welfare Costs in Counties Going Up.” The Tax Digest. 15.12 (1937): 406. 35 “Why Is Aged Cost High?” The Tax Digest. 31.2 (1953) 51, 56. 36 Floyd A. Bond, “Good Program of Aged Aid: ‘Reimbursement’ Agreements Advocated.” The Tax Digest. 33.2 (1955): 74. 37 California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 3, Folder 60, December 17, 1943, 111; Department of Social Welfare, Records of the Social Welfare Board, CSA. 38 Alberta Bedford, “Memorandum ReHearings on Old Age Pension,” Los Angeles, March 11, 1943, 4, Earl Warren Papers, Citizens’ Committee on Old Age Pensions and Pension Files, Box 1, Folder 4028, CSA. The ten-page memo summarized comments from the hearings held by the committee. No comments addressing responsible relative laws favored their retention. 32

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advocates argued that older Americans preferred and had earned their independence. Aileen Lowe bemoaned the dependence of her mother-inlaw on her and Lowe’s husband, arguing that a key problem with the responsible relative laws was that it “places the dependent mother in a most unhappy situation to be dependent upon her hard-working children.” In the one year (1949) that the laws were repealed in California by referendum, Lowe wrote that her mother-in-law was “like a new person and has said that it had removed a very heavy load from her shoulders.”39 Lorraine Barry echoed that view, writing that “parents’ independence of their children was one of their dearest possessions.”40 Alvin Schorr argues that a key outcome of responsible relative laws and residence laws in OAA programs was that they removed choice from the decision of extended families to live together or not; often it was economic necessity that determined living arrangements between generations.41 Dora Costa found that female recipients of OAA in the 1940s and 1950s were less likely to reside with their children if they were in states with no responsible relative laws than those where support obligations were enforced; more women chose to reside separate from children if finances and program requirements permitted it. OAA was the central program that older nonmarried women relied on; far fewer were eligible for OASI than OAA.42 Investigations of OAS applicants and recipients generated significant criticism from both aged parents and the children targeted for support fueling arguments about government intrusion. Responsible relative laws in California required that relatives (primarily adult children in OAS) be investigated regarding their ability to provide support – a practice employed by many states with support laws. Often this entailed sending forms to relatives seeking information about income and assets. Case workers interviewed children of applicants, particularly if it appeared the son or daughter could contribute but was unwilling to do so. A son wrote a scathing statement to the Santa Cruz Department of Public Welfare protesting the requirement that he provide information on his 39

Letter from Aileen Lowe to Governor Earl Warren dated December 14, 1949, 1, Box 2, Folder 4015, Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare, CSA. 40 Belford, “Memorandum Re Hearings on Old Age Pension,” 4. 41 Alvin L. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family (Washington, DC: Social Security Administration, 1960): 36. 42 Costa found that the size of grants was also a factor in whether women recipients lived with children. States with more generous benefits had fewer recipients living with relatives as women could afford to live independently. Dora L. Costa, “A House of Her Own: Old Age Assistance and the Living Arrangements of Older Nonmarried Women.” Journal of Public Economics. 72 (1999): 44–45, 47–48.

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income, arguing that “it is none of your business.”43 Case workers also contacted employers of adult children to check employment and income, which generated heated complaints from Mary Jane Everett in 1943. She wrote to California Governor Earl Warren that she had “suffered persecution from your visitors,” and her son had lost two positions because of case worker inquiries at hotels that employed him. Her son asked her to cancel her OAS grant when he secured another job as he feared losing it, but the burden of supporting her was considerable.44 A statement by McLain’s CCOAP echoed Everett’s views. The organization argued that the laws promoted “harassment and persecution both to old age pensioners and their children. It is a noxious provision of the law and should be repealed.”45 “Snooping” was a central complaint of both individuals protesting the investigations and pension organizations advocating for the recipients. For them, investigations were unwarranted government intrusion into their private lives. For members of the California state social welfare board, accusations of snooping intersected with misconceptions of the program as a pension rather than a public assistance program. Board members who met with the 1943 Governor’s committee on old age pensions encountered that accusation; board chairperson Archibald Young reported that the term “super-snooping” was not uncommon.46 Board member John Cuneo noted that most criticisms centered on the idea of snooping: “I told them once they got in their minds that they were administering a program that is on the basis of need and qualifying on many, many different points, they would understand that it was part of the necessary action to qualify these individuals and not snooping.”47 In the minds of many opponents of responsible relative laws, OAS was a pension earned by the elderly, rejecting the need for a means test to determine eligibility. That was not the administrative reality, and countered the requirements set forth in the

43

Statement to Santa Cruz Department of Public Welfare, in the case of Allie Duffy, unsigned, n.d. Box 75, Folder 4, Department of Social Welfare, Old Age Security, CSA. The statement has no date, but its placement in the records suggests it is from 1946 or 1947. 44 Letter from Mary Jane Everett to Gov. Earl Warren dated March 23, 1942, Folder 3937, Earl Warren Papers, Administration Files, Social Welfare Department, CSA. 45 Citizens’ Committee for Old Age Pensions, “To the Members of the Governor’s Committee for Study and Report on Old Age Pensions,” 3, Box 1, Folder 4028, Earl Warren Papers, Citizens Committee on Old Age Pensions and Pension Files, CSA. 46 California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 3, Folder 64, March 24, 1943, 3. 47 California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 3, Folder 65, April 1, 1943, 20.

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Social Security Act. States had to investigate need before granting benefits to receive matching funds from the federal government. County discretion in administration of OAS meant that recipients across the state could experience significantly different outcomes in the investigations of their parents’ cases, a key criticism of federal officials detailed in Chapter 1. According to a 1950 California report, twenty-two states placed administrative authority with counties, with the states only playing a supervisory role.48 Recipients and their families opposed such variation for the reasons SSA federal officials critiqued it: A recipient in one county could experience a very different level of investigation, and a different grant award, than one in another county. In 1943 a daughter of an OAS recipient wrote to George Wyman, state department of welfare director, to question why her support obligation was $10 for her father, who lived in one California county, but it was $15 for her mother, who lived in a different county. She asked him not “to respond by advising that each county has option here,” as she believed that reduced a state law to a county ordinance.49 Nonetheless, that was the answer she received, as the state law gave boards of supervisors discretion in determining liability. Wyman wrote, “I regret that we cannot give you the answer you wanted to hear, but . . . the differences in the computations of your liability by the two counties are matters which are properly within the discretion of the boards of supervisors involved.”50 County administrative practices resulted in the disparate outcomes in OAA investigations that frustrated OAS recipients and their families. In California, county boards of supervisors could determine if a responsible relative had “unusual expenses,” and adjust the required contribution accordingly. The key issue was how “unusual expenses” were counted. Some counties took the additional expenses off the income, thus adjusting the amount used to determine the relative’s liability. Other counties deducted the unusual expenses from the required support, thus reducing the relative’s contribution directly: “Widely different results are obtained

48

Other states played a direct role in OAA administration. Margaret Greenfield, Administration of Old Age Security in California (Berkeley, CA: Bureau of Public Administration, University of California, 1950): 13. 49 The name for the case is fictitious. The income files in this collection are restricted due to personal information, and thus all personal identification information must be changed. Letter from Mrs. Jane Roosevelt to George Wyman dated May 9, 1957, Box 170, Folder 10. Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA. 50 Letter to Jane Roosevelt from George Wyman dated May 15, 1957, Box 170, Folder 10, Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA.

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by these two methods.”51 One department official stated the policy bluntly in a 1953 memo: “The only way to achieve uniformity is to eliminate discretion. Since the legislature has provided for discretion, we are in no position to complain if the counties exercise it.”52 The law was revised later that year to allow for a uniform 20 percent reduction for unusual expenses, and the amount was to be taken off the total income and not the relative’s contribution, which did limit the varied results.53 These experiences hearken to practices in Indiana’s county agencies described in Chapter 1 regarding whether family support was actually received – was it “fictitious” income or income the recipient could rely on for their expenses? County discretion was a recurring criticism of the CCOAP, and shifting administration to the state was achieved briefly in Proposition 4 in 1948. Counties lost administrative authority in investigating and distributing OAS and Aid to the Blind, but also no longer paid a share of the costs of the program; the state worked in partnership with the federal government only in funding OAS and AB.54 Many counties administered the programs under contract with the state in the year before the amendment was repealed, but the state was the supervisory authority. When the amendment was repealed in 1949, the state reverted to county administration, but McLain’s organization continued to call for state administration until the implementation of the Supplemental Security Income program in 1974.55 Protests such as the CCOAP directly conflicted with states such as Indiana and California (and others) that sought more local discretion in administration – or a return to less federal intrusion in the administration of public assistance. 51

Letter to Allen Cooper from Madeline Sheridan dated November 23, 1953, Box 170, Folder 10, Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA. 52 Memo to Madeline Sheridan to Allan Cooper, dated November 25, 1953, Box 170, Folder 10. Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA. 53 Memo to Allen Cooper from Madeline Sheridan, dated November 23, 1953, Box 170, Folder 10. Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA. 54 Counties continued to administer Aid to Needy Children and General Assistance; ANC was jointly funded by the state, counties, and federal government. Elizabeth Perina, Old Age and Blind Security Programs in California: Proposition No. 4 (Article XXV, State Constitution) (Berkeley, CA: University of California, Bureau of Public Administration, 1949): 6, 8. 55 The Senior Citizens Sentinel repeatedly listed state administration (and then federal) as a key goal in its publication until the 1970s.

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family norms Criticisms of the support obligations of adult children were linked to family norms, and recipients protested the disconnect between the ideas of family enforced in support obligations and the reality of recipients’ experiences. Responsible relative obligations centered on the extended family as the norm in its requirement that adult children contribute to the support of aging parents. Opponents of support laws called out policymakers and agency staff on what they saw as outdated and unrealistic beliefs about family structure and operation. These assumptions contrasted those operating in OASI, discussed in Chapter 3, which focused on a nuclear family model as the norm in determining eligibility for survivor benefits. In OAA, the dependency of OAA applicants and recipients was not questioned, and responsible relative laws presumed that adult children, particularly sons, were obligated, both legally and morally, to provide financial support before taxpayers did. Interestingly, those protesting reliance on the extended family for support defended, at times implicitly, the nuclear family model that was not the norm for most American families. Broader trends shaped these shifts and expectations. Scholars have analyzed how decisions to delay marriage and children in the Great Depression, pointing to evidence of continued declines in both marriage and birth rates, prompted efforts to defend and promote marriage and the nuclear family despite the reality of most Americans.56 Other trends also fueled the rejection of an extended family model. Life expectancy was such by 1940 that parents, on average, survived about eleven years after the marriage of their youngest child, and about half of married couples shared thirty-nine years of marriage. Parents were living longer but also had fewer children to potentially provide for their support: By the mid1950s, “the burden is likely to fall on the shoulders of a few and to last for many years.”57 One survey in 1952 found that about 21 percent of OAS recipients lived with an adult child, while 26 percent of all aged did so.58 Studies found that children regularly saw their parents, if in geographic 56

Elaine Tyler May, Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era (New York: Basic Books, 2017): 3–7, 40–42. 57 Bond et al., The Needy Aged, 24. Ann Shola Orloff echoes Bond’s argument, noting that adult children were not abandoning their parents, but there were fewer adult children to carry that burden. Ann Shola Orloff, The Politics of Pensions: A Comparative Analysis of Britain, Canada, and the United States, 1880–1940 (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1993): 109. 58 Ibid., 282.

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proximity, but a minority lived together.59 Floyd Pinner’s 1959 study found that OAS recipients believed families had changed, and “explain[ed] the lack of support from their children as a consequence of economic necessity. And they fail to understand why some segments of the population insist upon the maintenance of the economic family unit when, in fact, it has ceased to exist.”60 The support obligations rested on family norms that simply were not the reality for most Americans, in the eyes of recipients. The disconnect between the reality of family structure and expectations of familial support harmed relationships, according to some recipients. Mrs. P. B. Brewer, writing to Governor Warren in 1951 in the context of the Governor’s Conference on Aging, complained that enforcement of responsible relative provisions “leads to family crisis, disruption and discord which we have in our own family.”61 In the case of John Smith in 1942, case workers recognized the potential for family conflict, “due to hostility between this daughter and Mrs. Smith.” To avoid exacerbating that hostility, case workers arranged to have his daughter make her $5 monthly contribution to the county department rather than directly to her father: “Under the plan neither Mr. Smith nor his wife will be aware that the daughter is contributing to his support.” This policy was not intended to be a regular practice, but only when “contributions made direct to the recipient would undoubtedly aggravate an already difficult situation to the detriment of the recipient of aid.”62 Administrators recognized the potential for such conflict, but sought to use administrative means to mitigate problems for families given the legislature’s refusal to repeal the support obligations.

59

Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family, 17. Pinner et al., Old Age and Political Behavior, 78. Orloff argues that the nuclear family has been the norm in the United States for the past 200 years. There were some aged adults who were more vulnerable, including widows, childless adults, and those who never married. Widows were far more likely to live with an adult child. Orloff, The Politics of Pensions, 95–97, 109–111. 61 Letter from Mrs. P. B. Brewer dated October 18, 1951, to Governor Warren, 2, Box 2, Folder 4026, Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare, CSA. 62 The name for the case is fictitious. The income files in this collection are restricted due to personal information, and thus all personal identification must be changed. Letter from Martha Chickering, director of the State Department of Social Welfare, to William Golden, County Welfare Department director, Ukiah, CA, dated June 17, 1942, 1–2; Department of Social Welfare, Old Age Security Income Files, Box 175, Folder 4, CSA; see also Memo to Elizabeth MacLatchie from Louis Kuplan, dated April 19, 1951, same collection, Folder 6. 60

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Another source of discord was married daughters’ contributions to parents, centered on notions of gender roles and family embedded in the enforcement of responsible relative laws. California’s policy in the 1940s and 1950s was to only consider a married daughter’s income that was deemed separate income and not community property.63 Separate income did not necessarily mean that the daughter earned her own wages, but rather what her husband decided was separate: “when there is no agreement between the daughter and her spouse whereby she is permitted to retain her earnings as separate property, her earnings represent income to her husband since they are under his management and control.”64 California’s policy reflected the persistence of coverture in American law and policy. In part this assumed that the husband controlled and managed the family income, even if his wife worked for wages. It assumed dependency of wives on husbands, and support obligations were filtered through the husband’s position. The wife’s primary obligation was to her husband, and not her parents, as reflected in California’s policy.65 As applied by the state welfare department, a daughter-in-law’s family finances were affected by the husband’s obligation to his parents, while the daughters were not, unless they had separate income.

63

California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 4, Folder 66, May 15, 1943, 60; California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 4, Folder 66, May 27, 1943, 43; Department of Social Welfare, Records of the Social Welfare Board, CSA; Greenfield, Administration of Old Age Security in California, 41. 64 Letter to Mr. J. A. Essex, Pomons, CA, from Martha Chickering, director, State DSW, dated April 15, 1943, 1; Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare, [no box number], Folder 3940, CSA; Jacobus tenBroek, “The Impact of Welfare Law Upon Family Law.” California Law Review. 42 (1954): 470–471; Joanna L. Grossman and Lawrence Meir Friedman, Inside the Castle: Law and Family in 20th Century America (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011): 194. 65 A 1953 Attorney General opinion in California complicated the language by making a distinction between “commingled” and “uncommingled” income. Administrators did not believe it would affect many cases, as most uncommingled income likely was counted as separate income. Letter to Charles Schottland from Louis Kaplan dated October 14, 1952, Box 170, Folder 10, Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA; Opinion of the Attorney General, September 22, 1952, 51/267, Box 170, Folder 10, Department of Social Welfare Records, Division of Public Assistance, Subject Files, CSA. For a discussion of coverture in American law and policy, see Linda Kerber, No Constitutional Right to Be Ladies (New York: Hill and Wang, 1998) and Hendrik Hartog, Man and Wife in America: A History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000). Kerber analyzes the role of coverture and women’s citizenship, arguing that coverture presumed that “married women owe their primary civic obligation to their husbands.” She argues that coverture was not undone until the 1992 Supreme Court decision Planned Parenthood v. Casey (xxiii, 307). Hartog analyzes a 1913 case in Ohio where justices ruled that while a son had a legal obligation to provide care for his mother, “that duty would never have devolved to his wife as part of her domestic duties” (297).

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North Dakota experienced similar discord when it eliminated room and board as a budget item for OAA recipients living with legally responsible relatives; the change presumed that the provision of shelter and food was a family obligation and OAA grants were reduced accordingly. The change prompted three fair hearing appeals, and the state hearing officials reversed the county decision because “sons-in-law were not legally responsible relatives.”66 County officials were “objecting very seriously,” arguing that “if the daughter has a homestead right in the home, the client is living in the home of a legally responsible relative.”67 North Dakota was averaging about four hearings per month, and the requirement of sons-in-law’s support was an issue of contention, speaking to assumptions about gender and legal obligations to support. The differentiation between married daughters and sons fostered the resentment of daughters-in-law whose husbands were expected to contribute – thus taking resources from their family – while daughters could be exempt. Aileen Lowe questioned this practice in a letter to Governor Warren December 14, 1949. Her income was added to her husband’s to determine his support obligation for his father, under community property, and thus her mother-in-law was not eligible for a “pension,” leaving her son to support her. Meanwhile his sister had no obligation because she did not work. Such policies, noted Lowe, fueled resentment not only between siblings but also between husbands and wives.68 Another letter, signed “A Very Worried Daughter-in-Law,” expressed similar sentiments, noting that regardless of her husband’s income, the daughter was relieved of all financial obligation, “if she is not working, or is not in BUSINESS FOR HERSELF,” while “A DAUGHTER-IN-LAW AND HER CHILDREN HAVE TO DO WITHOUT.” The daughter’s family is “able to live in luxury . . . year after year.” The author ended the letter by asking that officials “GET AFTER THE RESPONSIBLE RELATIVES THAT HAVE BIG BANK ACCOUNTS AND THE ONES THAT HAVE THE SAME SCALE OF SALARY COMING IN YEAR AFTER YEAR AND LET THE MAN WITH CHILDREN BRING UP HIS FAMILY WITHOUT AN EXTRA “Current Activity Report,” December 1, 1948, 8, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 67 “Current Activity Report,” December 1, 1948, 8. 68 Letter from Aileen Lowe to Governor Earl Warren dated December 14, 1949, 1, Box 2, Folder 4015, Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare, CSA. 66

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BURDEN AND WORRY.”69 Some recipients and family members perceived the differentiation of support obligations between sons and married daughters as inequitable, and in some cases these gendered policies exacerbated family discord.

fair hearings and courts as resistance Recipients and families employed both fair hearings and court challenges to contest agency decisions regarding eligibility, grant awards, and case closures. Fair hearings were required under SSA guidelines, and hearing policies and practices were among the issues federal officials monitored in their reviews. Court challenges, however, were not available to all. These cases required resources, and not all states permitted court challenges in their public assistance system. Both fair hearings and court challenges demonstrate families’ frustration with responsible relative policies, including support requirements and property transfers, and the burden they imposed on family resources. Fair hearings in particular highlight the voices of recipients and families. Although both court decisions and fair hearing records were filtered through the officials moderating them, fair hearings at times included transcripts of cases – in some cases detailed transcriptions of the hearing. Allowing recipients to voice their experiences and views was a key goal of the hearings, and both fair hearings and court cases – although not a representative sample across states or counties – provide insight into the challenges and burdens these policies imposed on recipients and their families. Responsible relative policies pushed many children’s ability to help parents to the limits, and at times children’s reluctance or refusal to provide support caused hardship on aging Americans. A federal requirement of state public assistance programs was to provide applicants and recipients with an opportunity to protest an agency’s decision regarding their ADC, AB, or OAA grant. The right to a fair hearing was a critical part of the rise of rights discourse in public assistance, and recipients and applicants took advantage of the opportunity to contest local agency decisions.70 If dissatisfied with a decision by a local case worker and perhaps gaining no relief from the office supervisory staff, the individual could request a fair hearing to move the conversation 69

Letter received November 19, 1949, to Warren, Box 2, Folder 4014, Earl Warren Papers, Administrative Files, Social Welfare, CSA. Emphasis in original. 70 Tani, States of Dependency, 91–96.

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to a higher level. Fair hearings were “to prevent discrimination against, or unjust treatment of, applicants and beneficiaries.”71 They served as a “check” on public assistance administration, allowing recipients and applicants an opportunity for a review of their case to ensure their case was handled according to established policy. Reasons for requests for fair hearings and the numbers of fair hearings based on program and place varied widely, pointing to variations in state procedures for fair hearings. Some states were careful to notify all their applicants and recipients about this right; others sought to “hide” such information to reduce the likelihood of such a request, often a strategy to limit caseloads and public assistance costs. Regardless, fair hearings were a space for recipients to protest a denial of assistance, the amount of assistance granted, or expectations of support from relatives.72 As with all parts of state public assistance administration, SSA officials could recommend and require certain elements, but state officials had a great deal of latitude in how they adhered to those requirements. Fair hearings were a new concept for most agencies when they were required in the 1935 Social Security Act. State officials established different requirements for a fair hearing request, and some were limited – by statute or policy – to those denied aid. Even in states with more restricted laws or policies, however, administrative practice was more flexible. States that had some type of appeal procedure usually allowed appeals for numerous reasons.73 Ideally, fair hearings not only provided claimants with access to a review of a disputed outcome, but also enabled states to review – and correct – local agency practices. Fair hearings also might highlight policy issues that needed more widespread attention. The goal was to avoid the need for fair hearings via effective public assistance administration, but local, state, and federal officials did not always agree on what constituted effective administration.74 OAA saw the highest number of fair hearings among public assistance programs in the post-World War II era, although the number of fair hearings varied across states and within states. A report on fair hearings in the late 1940s by the Bureau of Public Assistance (BPA) found more 71

Robert Tucker Lansdale, The Administration of Old Age Assistance (Chicago, IL: Social Science Research Council, 1939): 298. 72 Tani, States of Dependency, 91–96, 117–119; Hilary M. Leyendecker, Problems and Policy in Public Assistance (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1955): 94–101. 73 Lansdale, The Administration of Old Age Assistance, 301. 74 Ibid., 298–299; Scholz, “Hearings in Public Assistance,” 14; “Hearings in Public Assistance, January 1945–December 1947,” Social Security Bulletin. 11.9 (1948): 18.

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than 13,000 fair hearing requests in the OAA program alone across more than forty states from mid-1945 to mid-June 1947. OAA recipients also appealed their case decisions at higher rates: OAA had about 11 appeals per 1,000 rejections compared to 10 in the AB program and 2 in ADC in an analysis of two years of fair hearing data in 1947–1948.75 OAA claimants accounted for more than 85 percent of all fair hearing requests in that period; some periods saw OAA claims accounting for more than 90 percent.76 OAA recipients outnumbered those receiving ADC and AB until 1955, but ADC caseloads increased dramatically by the 1960s.77 Fair hearings became a key tool deployed by the welfare rights movement, centered largely around AFDC recipients by the 1960s, but clearly were also employed by OAA recipients and advocacy organizations in the earlier years of the programs.78 Advocacy groups promoted the use of fair hearings for OAA recipients, although recipients requested them in states that had no such group for the aged. As described earlier in this chapter, the elderly in some states had a strong system of advocacy groups dating to the 1930s, from the Townsend organizations to the CCOAP to the WPU. When the state of Washington enacted a maximum grant of $50, the number of appeals for grant decisions increased, in part encouraged by WPU activists, according to a 1943 federal administrative review. The WPU encouraged OAA recipients who were not approved for the maximum grant to request a fair hearing.79 Assistance with appeals was a benefit of membership in the CCOAP, and recipients sought the organization’s guidance in California. Members of the CCOAP would join recipients in their fair hearing appeals, heard by the California Social Welfare Board. At a 1944 meeting, four recipients were in attendance for fair hearings, joined by other recipients as well as George McLain, CCOAP director. In opening comments, a board member welcomed all to the meeting, but cautioned them from believing reports circulated allegedly by the CCOAP that the organization could ensure

75

Tani, States of Dependency, 120. The analysis of the statistical data is from Tani, States of Dependency, 118. 77 Michael B. Katz, The Price of Citizenship: Redefining the American Welfare State (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001): 5; Brown, Race, Money and the American Welfare State, 171–173. 78 Kornbluh, The Battle for Welfare Rights, 62–66, 70–77. 79 “Current Activity Report,” February 16, 1944, 4, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Washington, Box 104, Folder 623.1/03, NA-CP. 76

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a more favorable outcome financially if the organization assisted in the appeal. Board member John Martin noted that claimants “will get the same consideration, and every effort will be given to see that you are done justice whether you are represented here in person or by some representative. And the fact that the agent of some organization appears here for you and claims to gain money for you that you would not have gotten otherwise is entirely erroneous.”80 In his response to the hearing comments, McLain refuted the idea that the organization had indicated the board was influenced by his presence. But he also invoked the language of rights: We of course are running a service organization. We have a right to appear before this group as your agent and no one can deny you that right and no member of this Board can deny you that right of appearing before you as your agent and we ask only that the Old Age Security laws of the State of California be adhered to by those who are administering the law.81

Fair hearing data from the earlier cited report shows that California and Washington were among the states with the highest number of fair hearing requests: California was one of five with more than 500 (that category peaked at 999) and Washington was one of five with more than 1,000 (the range reached 1,499).82 A 1941 federal review of Missouri’s public assistance program noted that one county in the state had a “somewhat militant pressure group which interested itself in the oldage assistance recipients and applicants,” and the county had the highest rate of appeals. But the local agency also was among the most diligent in informing clients of the right to appeal.83 Illinois’ Department of Public Welfare received 700 requests for fair hearings in 1936 and 1937, fueled in part by pension organizers, although few were successful in changing the case’s outcome.84 Illinois had two organizations advocating for OAA recipients: the Illinois Old Age Pension Union and the Old Age Assistance Pension Union (OAAPU) of Illinois. The former group sought to assist applicants with the application process and was led by an OAA recipient. Department staff viewed the OAAPU with much more suspicion 80

California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 4, Folder 79, April 27, 1944, 117; Department of Social Welfare, Records of the State Social Welfare Board, CSA. 81 California Board of Social Welfare minutes, Box 4, Folder 79, April 27, 1944, 117–118. 82 “Hearings in Public Assistance, January 1945–December 1947,” 18. 83 “Missouri First Annual Administrative Review Period April 1, 1940 through June 30, 1941,” IX-1, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 620.62/03, NACP. 84 Tani, States of Dependency, 93.

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and believed organizers were engaged in fraudulent practices. The OAAPU did help those seeking fair hearings, and their success at securing reversals prompted other recipients to request fair hearings.85 The role of pension groups in promoting and participating in fair hearings for recipients, and their use in OAA cases before the 1960s, again underscores a need to rethink the chronology of the welfare rights movement. Federal officials reviewed state plans and practices regarding fair hearings and encouraged state and county agencies to notify clients of the availability of hearings under any circumstance – a denial of aid, a reduction in aid, or a cancellation of aid. Federal officials criticized the practices of some states, including North Dakota, which only notified claimants of the right to appeal if the application was rejected or the case was closed: Such notification “was only necessary after the decision had been made and then only in those instances in which it appeared that the applicant or recipient would be definitely dissatisfied with the decision.”86 The latter point is likely why the issues with room and board and the status of sons-in-law emerged, described in the previous section; people were unhappy with the decisions and thus agency workers offered the fair hearing option. States that did not notify applicants and recipients of the right to appeal still received complaints and appeals focusing on responsible relative issues. Maryland’s policy did not require notification of the right to appeal, a practice criticized more than once in federal reviews. The agencies also often used “informal rejections” in which applications were denied without a full investigation.87 Deterring or diverting applications, via no investigation, follows the state’s practice of allowing agencies to deny applicants who called OAA a pension, a point highlighted earlier in the chapter. Maryland officials likely used these mechanisms to keep caseloads and costs down. Comments in federal reviews focused more on complaints rather than hearings, likely because the agencies had fewer hearings due to their nonotification policy. A large number of complaints in the state from 1943 to 1945 related to the income scale used to determine the contributions of Wilbur C. Hallwachs, “Fair Hearings in the Administration of Old Age Assistance in Illinois,” Master’s Thesis, School of Social Service Administration, Chicago, IL, 1943, 43–44, 48–50. 86 “Official Third Annual Report, 1/1/43–12/31/43,” 1, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, North Dakota, Box 77, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 87 “Maryland – Second Annual Report of the Review of the Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1941–June 30, 1942,” 10 and “Maryland – Fourth Annual Report of the Review of the Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1943–June 30, 1944,” 1, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maryland, Box 45, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP 85

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responsible relatives. Eleven complaints in 1943 dealt with responsible relative contributions; fifteen of the twenty complaints received in 1945 were from recipients whose grants were adjusted or canceled due to the expected contributions of adult children.88 Despite the lack of notification, twentyseven appeals were sent to the state office in 1942–43, and the majority focused on the state’s income scale for responsible relatives.89 The year before just three of the twenty appeals addressed responsible relative issues.90 A study of six months of fair hearing data in Massachusetts in 1941 found that 45 percent of all hearings centered on requirements for support by adult children.91 In 1945, 56 percent of Ohio’s appeals addressed responsible relative issues; Ohio’s state policies also included no notification of the right to appeal.92 Recipients pursued the opportunity to protest the obligation to support relatives, even in states that sought to minimize their availability or lacked a strong advocacy group for the elderly. Missouri – a state that enforced family support despite no formal legal requirement for relatives – received repeated critiques of its fair hearing practices, particularly during the 1940s. A 1942 federal review noted that “the appeal procedure has been recognized as one of the problems in the administration of public assistance in Missouri since the inception of the programs.”93 The same report noted the disconnect between manual guidelines and practice, including considering fair hearing content as an “Maryland – Fourth Annual Report of the Review of the Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1943–June 30, 1944,” 54–55 and “Maryland – Fifth Annual Report of the Review of the Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1944–June 30, 1945,” 61, 63–66, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maryland, Box 45, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 89 “Maryland – Third Annual Report of the Review of the Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1943–June 30, 1944,” 17, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Maryland, Box 45, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 90 “Maryland – Second Annual Report of the Review of the Public Assistance Administration, July 1, 1941–June 30, 1942,” 28. Maryland’s fair hearing numbers were not included in the reports on 1947–1948; it is not included in the list of states with total hearings recorded. “Hearings in Public Assistance, January 1945– December 1947,” 18. 91 Just 18 percent of appeals regarding relatives’ support were successful. Alton A. Linford, “Responsibility of Children in the Massachusetts Old Age Assistance Program II, Legislation and Administration, 1936–42,” Social Service Review. 19.2 (1945): 234. 92 “Fifth Annual Administrative Review,” 1/1/44 through 6/30/45, 28–29, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Ohio, Box 79, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 93 “Missouri Second Annual Administrative Review Period Ending 6/30/42,” IX-1, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 88

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indication for policy change or consideration of the findings in the case in determining an outcome.94 By 1943 local agencies were instructed to notify all recipients of their right to appeal, and a pamphlet describing the process was included in all OAA checks mailed in July that year.95 Delays in holding hearings were another ongoing issue. Of the 217 cases in the first six months of 1943, just forty-two hearings were held within one month and another forty-four within two; the rest took more time, some as long as six months.96 Federal reviews continued to be critical of Missouri’s practices, and a 1948 review again stated that “the handling of fair hearings in Missouri is still most unsatisfactory.”97 Even the state’s director of social services was critical of the department’s process, telling federal officials that he believed Missouri’s fair hearing practices had reached an “all-time low.”98 Despite these critiques, Missouri was one of five states with the highest number of fair hearing requests; recipients sought relief in what many federal officials saw as a deeply flawed system. Details on fair hearings are scattered and uneven, but Hearings in Public Assistance, published by the BPA from 1948 to 1950, provides valuable insight into recipients’ experiences with support requirements. I analyze the types of cases presented, the arguments posed by recipients and their families, and the assessment of federal officials regarding how the hearings were conducted and the decisions reached. The agency’s goal via the publication was to help state and local agencies improve their administrative and fair hearing practices with examples and commentary. The publication – produced in two volumes and eight issues over the two years – highlighted key cases appealed to a fair hearing, selected from those voluntarily submitted by state agencies. The cases are in no way representative and were selected by the BPA for instructional value to state and local agency staff.99 Some cases include the fair hearing decision and

“Missouri Second Annual Administrative Review Period Ending 6/30/42,” IX-1-IX4. “Missouri Third Annual Administrative Review Period Ending 6/30/43,” VIII-2, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 620.62/03, NA-CP. 96 “Missouri Third Annual Administrative Review Period Ending 6/30/43,” VIII-4. 97 “Current Activities Report,” July 26, 1948, 4, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 623.1/03, NA-CP. 98 “Current Activities Report,” January 30, 1948, 4, SSA Records, Records of Welfare Organizations and Topics, RG 47.8, Bureau of Public Assistance, Correspondence, Missouri, Box 56, Folder 623.1/03, NA-CP. 99 Hearings in Public Assistance: A Series of Selected Decisions Issued by State Public Assistance Agencies and Released with Comments. 1.1 (1947): n.p. 94 95

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commentary by federal officials on the cases, highlighting positives and negatives. The publication of the cases, which were not identified by state, was intended to emphasize to agencies the need to ensure that claimants had the right to a fair hearing. Of the forty-eight cases profiled, thirty-six (75 percent) dealt with OAA recipients, and thirteen (36 percent of the OAA cases profiled) addressed either responsible relative contributions or property transfers to adult children.100 An important goal of the fair hearing was to give recipients space to tell their story. My primary focus is to analyze their narratives for insights into how these support laws affected families and why they challenged local agency decisions. The case of William Blank raised the issue of the limits to adult children’s contributions – how much was too much to ask? Blank’s case focused on whether his daughter, Mary Smith, had to exhaust her savings to support her father. In 1940, Blank, who was eighty-three and lived with Smith, challenged his county agency’s decision to cancel his grant after four years due to his daughter’s savings. She had received $2,500 in life insurance when her husband died two years earlier, and still had $2,000 when the hearing was held. She also owned the home they lived in. The agency argued that grants were based on a “family unit policy” if members shared a household, and thus her assets were relevant in the case investigation. This case illustrates the potential effects of such support requirements on a family that faced limited ability to support themselves. Smith, who was fifty-two years old, argued that she needed the insurance funds to ensure her own care later, due to her ill health, or she would become dependent as her father was. Severe arthritis rendered her unemployable; she relied on the insurance money for her own support. She planned to use her home to pay for institutional care when she needed it: “I have only the use of my fingers. If these fingers become disabled, then I must have someone to take care of me bodily and I must pay my way through this world.”101 To use those funds for her father’s care would jeopardize her future care: “My resources are decreasing and I cannot continue. It is absolutely unfair to take my support away from me.”102 When the local Hearings in Public Assistance, vol. 1–4, 1947–1950. Three of the “cases” were sample forms used by different agencies, and were not included in my count of cases and their content. Other hearings regarding OAA cases focused on different issues of eligibility, including need, residence, age, and citizenship. One case addresses the status of a Native American man that local officials deemed a “ward of the state.” That decision was reversed. 101 102 “Case Number 10,” Hearings in Public Assistance. 1.3 (1947): 12–13. Ibid., 13. 100

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case worker suggested she could apply for OAA once her savings were gone, even if she still owned her home, Smith instantly rejected it, invoking the ideas of citizenship and rights: “I would never apply for assistance. As an American, I think I have some rights and I am trying to exercise those rights.”103 She stressed that she was not abdicating her responsibility to her father but needed to ensure her own care. She had no children or other family that would care for her: “Please understand that I want to share everything I have with my father, if I have the assurance that I will never be put into great need and have to suffer and not get relief.”104 The state appeals committee reversed the local agency’s decision and reinstated Blank’s grant, arguing that canceling the grant was “unreasonable and contrary to the purpose for which OAA was established”; such action “would not be an exercise of reasonable discretion to pauperize Smith, in effect, by requiring her to support her father.”105 The committee questioned the extent of the obligation to provide support, ruling that legally responsible relatives were entitled to consider their own future care in their support of a parent. Placing a family member in the path of future reliance on OAA was not the goal of support laws, according to state officials, agreeing with Smith’s argument. Nine of the cases profiled in Hearings in Public Assistance centered on property transfers – cases in which OAA grants were denied or canceled because a recipient transferred property to a relative in a time frame that violated state law. These cases demonstrate the intersection of property requirements and responsible relative laws, as family often stood to benefit. Many states with property transfer laws prohibited such transfers within two to five years of applying to prevent applicants from bypassing recovery and lien laws or to reduce their assets to qualify for OAA. As discussed in Chapter 1, such laws were also intended to prevent children from benefiting from an OAA recipient’s estate if they refused to provide support. A key question in these cases, depending on state law, was whether the intent of the transfer was to reduce their assets in order to qualify for OAA. Some states prohibited all property transfers and those state laws assumed the intent was to qualify for OAA; anyone transferring property in the prohibited time frame was denied OAA. Other states included no such assumption, and case workers had to determine intent if a property transfer occurred.106

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104 Ibid., 12. Ibid., 13. Ibid., 21; Daniel R. Mandelker, “Family Responsibility under the American Poor Laws.” Michigan Law Review. 54.4 (1956): 514–515. 106 Lansdale et al., The Administration of Old Age Assistance, 92. 105

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Two of the cases addressed individuals found to transfer property without receiving appropriate compensation; in the eyes of welfare department staff, they wasted a potential resource for their support. In one case, Mr. Ellis (no first name provided) exchanged his farm for a home in town with his son, Edward. Edward had apparently purchased the home at a tax sale when his father failed to pay the taxes. The local agency denied the application, and state officials affirmed that decision.107 The exchange was determined to be of unequal value, and both the local agency and state officials decided the father had transferred property “without receiving commensurate value in return.”108 State law allowed for consideration of intent, but neither local nor state officials felt it mitigated the transfer. The couple was denied OAA, and it was unclear how they would provide for themselves; federal officials, who criticized both the investigations and delayed hearing process, also noted that local and state officials failed to address how the couple lived on the small farm income before the property transfer.109 In another case, Dorothy Doolittle was denied OAA because she sold her home and property for $1,800, and then transferred $1,200 to her two sons – in excess of the state’s $750 limit. As with Ellis, she transferred the property “without receiving fair consideration.”110 Family relations – often in the form of conflict – played a role in the transfer of assets, or what appeared to be a transfer of assets, and how those relations shaped intent in these cases. The investigation of George and Mary Galt’s applications for OAA, submitted on June 8, 1948, found that Galt withdrew $750 from his bank account before applying for aid and gave it to his son. The withdrawal was made on May 28, 1948, and the local agency found the timing indicated the transfer was to qualify for assistance and denied the couple OAA grants.111 Galt reported that he had been holding the funds for his son, Harold, who was in the midst of a contentious divorce. The couple was protecting the money from Harold’s estranged wife. Federal officials questioned the lack of investigation into why they transferred the money, a point which apparently came out in the meeting with the state official assigned to the hearing.112 The field investigator, who prepared the report for the hearing office in August 1948, noted that “the statements by Mr. and Mrs. Galt seemed to be very frank and spontaneous and there appeared to be no

“Case Number 37,” Hearings in Public Assistance. 3.1 (1949): 4–7. 108 Ibid., 8. Ibid. 110 “Case Number 27,” Hearings in Public Assistance. 2.2 (1948): 12–15. 111 “Case Number 39,” Hearings in Public Assistance. 3.1 (1949): 16–17. 112 Ibid., 17–18. 107 109

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disagreement in their stories.” The son also submitted a statement attesting to his parents’ claim.113 The state hearing report found for the couple, rejecting the argument that their intent was to qualify for public assistance. Other documentation corroborated the Galts’ narrative: “our conclusion was that claimants could not have told such a compatible and ingenious story unless it were true.”114 Federal officials do not comment on this, but the voices of the Galts are clear in the summary report, despite the lack of a hearing transcript. Fair hearings were to correct erroneous decisions by local agencies and to provide claimants with a means to tell their account of events. Both were evident in this case. A critique in the case that followed sheds light on federal officials’ emphasis on giving applicants space to explain their circumstances for a fresh audience. Mr. and Mrs. Marten were denied OAA in November 1947 because they transferred $1,400 to their daughter, claiming they owed her money. A 1938 application was denied as the couple had transferred property to their son-in-law but retained a life lease in the property. They were denied again, and the state upheld the denial as the couple could not account for a bank withdrawal of $2,000. Federal officials criticized the state field representative for relying solely on the agency’s account, writing that the field representative “as in the [Galts’] case, listened rather than discussed the case with local agency, claimant, and claimant’s legal adviser, and thus failed to contribute toward an intelligent preparation for the hearing by the participants.”115 Rather than reviewing the case with all the parties, the field representative in both cases relied on what was reported by the local agency, missing an opportunity for a new look at the case. The state confirmed the denial, but primarily on the unexplained bank withdrawal, and not the other issues.116 Recipients sought fair hearings to voice their perspectives, and federal officials saw those perspectives as critical to a reexamination of the case. One case profiled in detail speaks directly to the importance of context in evaluating intent in a property transfer. The case also highlights the extensive support some family members gave aging parents and the limits of that support. What emerges in the hearing is the story of four children who provided considerable help – monetary aid, labor, and caregiving – for their parents before their mother’s death. Mr. Freeman’s case appears

113

114 Ibid., 19. Ibid. “Case No. 40,” Hearings in Public Assistance. 3.1 (1949): 23. Pages 23–24 are not included in the electronic version, but are in the print version of this volume. 116 Ibid., 24. 115

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in two issues of the Hearings publication – in the last issue of 1948 and again in the first issue of 1949. The case includes the full hearing transcript, a rare opportunity to hear the voices of recipients and family without filter. Mr. Freeman explained the reason for his hearing request: “I figure I am entitled to assistance because of my age.”117 When he described the care his wife required – provided by both himself and their children – he said simply “That is what made me old.”118 In his view, the family had given enough. Freeman’s OAA grant was canceled in March 1948 because local officials believed he transferred property to his children to qualify for support. He began receiving OAA in December 1945, when heart problems precluded him from maintaining his farm. The local agency determined he transferred his property, a home and farm of 160 acres, to his four children on January 27, 1948, almost one month after his wife, who had been bedridden from a stroke for nine years, died. He did so to repay his children for all they had done. Both sons had maintained the farm and paid for improvements. Both served in the military and sent allowances home to their parents; they also helped pay the significant medical bills from their mothers’ lengthy illness. Both daughters cared for their mother when she was ill. Mr. Freeman retained a life interest in the farm, and three of the children deeded their share of the property to the oldest son, Gordon, who took over the farm work when his father became too ill to do so.119 Case workers determined that the property transfer violated state law. While debts could be considered in a property transfer, they had to be reported at the time of application and could not be considered if those to whom the debt is owed – the children – may eventually inherit the property. Consequently, his grant was canceled.120 The hearing transcript demonstrates the power of personal testimony in conveying the family’s circumstances. Gordon described his contributions to his parents’ care matter-of-factly, detailing work he did and bills he paid, as well as the money he and his brother, Henry, sent to their parents while in the service. He estimated he had contributed $2,500, and his brother estimated he had sent $1,100 to his parents while in the Merchant Marines.121 He recalled that his brother had the allotment sent to his parents because “the folks were hard up and he wanted it taken out . . . He was like myself. He stayed there and worked, even after we got to be men of our own.” His sisters “stayed there over my mother all the time, day 117

118 No Case Number, Hearings in Public Assistance. 2.4 (1948): 3. Ibid., 10. 120 “Case Number 38,” Hearings in Public Assistance. 3.1 (1949): 11–13. Ibid., 14. 121 These contributions would be $13,746 and $31,242 in 2022 dollars, respectively. 119

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and night. No matter how cold the night, they were up helping.”122 He described his own reasons for helping his parents: “I did not stay there because I wanted to get the place and all that. I stayed there because I felt they needed me and if he wanted to give me that back in return, that is fine. I had sacrificed ten years of my life to be right there. That is about all there is to it.”123 Neighbors who spoke at the hearing corroborated the accounts and one said simply “If anyone is entitled to a pension, I think Mr. Freeman would be.”124 When asked about the life lease his father held in the farm and home, Gordon said “He is welcome there any time, day or night.”125 The transcript highlights the honesty and clarity of the family members’ statements and the extent of their efforts to help their parents in very difficult circumstances; the simplicity of the statements is striking. In its decision, the appeals committee reversed the local agency’s cancellation based on the family’s extensive support and faulty application of state policy. The family’s voices were critical in the decision. The committee reported that “the money and services given by the children were over and above normal maintenance and exchange of services within families.” Freeman received a fair value for the property he transferred, due to both the past contributions and the life interest he held.126 The committee rejected the agency’s argument that Freeman had failed to report his debts when he applied. That policy was not enacted until 1947, long after Mr. Freeman’s initial application in December 1945.127 Federal officials praised the hearing officer for her ability to let Freeman and others who spoke make their statements without interruption. She let Freeman “have his say first, an additional safeguard of his interest.”128 She did not review the case before the hearing, focusing solely on what was presented that day. The result was a fresh review of the case based on the family’s statements, a reconsideration of the intent of the property transfer, and a correction of a mistake by local officials, according to federal officials. The case also demonstrates the extent to which children did assist their parents, and a parent’s desire to limit and reward that assistance.

the courts as resistance Although deployed less frequently than hearings, the courts were another arena of resistance to responsible relative provisions, including laws governing recovery and property transfers. As with fair hearings, using the 122 127

123 No Case Number, 12. Ibid., 13. 128 Ibid., 28. Ibid., 34.

124

Ibid., 14.

125

Ibid., 17.

126

Ibid., 29.

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courts to assert a right to public assistance occurred long before the 1960s welfare rights movement, and while the ability of a claimant to seek redress varied by geography and means, the courts proved an important tool to challenge decisions related to responsible relatives. While Tani’s analysis of court cases extends to all types of public assistance, my focus will be on those related to OAA, which is a majority of such cases, and more specifically to responsible relative provisions. The cases overlap in content and theme with fair hearing cases, but as with all legal cases, are decided within a larger body of court decisions. Tani found that the vast majority of court cases between 1935 and 1960 addressed OAA recipients – all but 13 of the 117 cases she analyzed were OAA cases.129 The majority of those cases were heard in Missouri, which had the highest number of such cases of any state and, as you will recall, had among the highest number of fair hearings. My pool includes forty-five cases, dating from 1938 to 1974. Some cases overlap with Tani’s analysis, and others were found via searches or references in other materials. Of those cases, thirty-two were in Missouri state courts; California came in second with six. Oregon and Washington each had two of the cases analyzed, and Michigan, Minnesota, and South Dakota each had one. The uneven geography of these cases was a function of reporting practices of states; some states did not publish all decisions (particularly those from intermediate courts) and thus many more recipients likely pursued claims in courts. Not all states had laws allowing claimants to pursue their cases in the court system: just seven explicitly permitted such actions (Connecticut, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, and Washington) and twenty-one state laws had no provision, or a prohibition, regarding individuals’ right to pursue action via common law. The decisions of state public welfare departments were considered final in eighteen other states, closing off any legal action.130 While the numbers are important to illustrate trends in these cases, the content of the cases also demonstrate key areas of contest in responsible relative enforcement. As with fair hearings, they demonstrate what support requirement practices recipients and their families found more problematic or unjust. A series of court cases challenged the constitutionality of various forms of responsible relative laws, culminating in the 1973 California case, Swoap v. Superior Court of Sacramento County. Most challenges focused on the equal protection clause, the issue of double taxation, or the due process clause. In Swoap the California Supreme Court 129

Tani, States of Dependency, 128–129.

130

Ibid., 129–130.

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concluded that the 1971 Welfare Reform Act requiring support of aging parents did not violate the equal protection clause of the Constitution. Scholars agree that the case ended debates over the constitutionality of such provisions. Two OAA recipients, Ila Huntley and Bieuky Dykstra, along with their adult children, Howard Huntley and Julius Dykstra, argued that the requirement that relatives reimburse the state for aid paid to their parents violated the equal protection clause as such laws “arbitrarily charged welfare costs to one class in society and thereby denied equal protection of the laws.”131 The superior court of Sacramento County ruled that the 1971 law was unconstitutional, and a temporary restraining order halted such enforcement. State welfare officials appealed and secured a temporary halt to the order, pending review by the state Supreme Court. The California Supreme Court, with one dissent, rejected the equal protection argument and ruled the law constitutional, preserving a cornerstone of Governor Ronald Reagan’s efforts to reduce public assistance costs by enforcing family support obligations.132 Twenty-two of the forty-five cases analyzed focused on the question of resources – recipients and their families challenged their responsibility and ability to provide support. Jasper Moore, age seventy and no longer able to work, began receiving OAA in July 1937, but his grant was canceled in February 1938 because he was receiving support from his daughter. The circuit court reversed that decision, and the Missouri Court of Appeals agreed. Prior to legislative revisions in 1939, which occurred after the cancellation of Moore’s grant, OAA in Missouri was not affected by relatives’ support. The court decision acknowledged the error, writing that “whether it was wise or unwise not to withhold benefits from one who has a child willing and able to support him is a matter for the Legislature and not a question for the courts.” The court ruled that under the law the daughter had no legal obligation to support her father, and that resources and income did not “include gifts which may or may

131

Swoap v. Superior Court of Sacramento County, 10 Cal. 3d 390 (Supreme Court, California), December 12, 1973; Catherine Doscher Byrd, “Relative Responsibility Extended: Requirement of Adult Children to Pay for Their Indigent Parent’s Medical Needs.” Family Law Quarterly. 22 (1998–1999): 91. For a discussion of the constitutionality question that predates the Swoap decision, see Michael Rosenbaum, “Are Family Responsibility Laws Constitutional?” Family Law Quarterly. 1.4 (1967): 55–76 and Leo Tully, “Family Responsibility Laws: An Unwise and Unconstitutional Imposition.” Family Law Quarterly. 5 (1971): 32–62. 132 Swoap v. Superior Court of Sacramento County.

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not be made at some future time.”133 In this case, the courts provided valuable oversight over agency decisions regarding support laws, relieving Moore’s daughter of the financial responsibility to provide support. The Missouri legislature amended the law in 1939 to address support more explicitly. The revised law defined eligibility to exclude those who “[have] . . . income, or resources, whether such income or resources is received from some other person or persons, gifts or otherwise, sufficient to meet his needs.” The law’s revision prompted an opposite ruling in the case of Lizzie Buettner whose OAA grant was canceled in June 1939. She was living with her daughter and son-in-law, who had supported her for sixteen years. The son-in-law refused to support her any longer, although he was able to do so. Given the change in the law, the court ruled that she was no longer eligible for OAA, citing the Moore case specifically as reflecting a change in the law. The court ruled that the law’s amendment clearly showed the legislature’s intent, and Buettner’s grant remained canceled.134 How the ruling affected Buettner’s circumstances is not clear: Did her son-in-law continue to provide support (perhaps grudgingly) or was she forced to move and find other means of support? The decision does not include the daughter’s perspective, so we do not know if she agreed with her husband regarding her mother’s support, and if so, why. Whether she had the means to support her independently is also not addressed. Unlike fair hearings, which might include a transcript, we only have the summary provided in the decision. Although Missouri had no law mandating responsible relative support, instead relying on its general support law, the state’s courts heard a majority of the responsible relative cases in my sample. Justices often affirmed the obligations of adult children to support their parents. State and local agencies consistently enforced such support, considering it a form of income and resource. After the 1939 law’s revision, the aged receiving family support were deemed ineligible for OAA. Justices often commented on the moral obligation of family to support aged parents. One court ruling found that the law “was never intended to lift from the shoulders of children their filial and moral obligation to supply life’s necessities to aged and infirm parents who had nourished them through

133

Moore v. State Social Security Commission, 233 Mo. App. 536, December 5, 1938 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 134 Buettner v. State Social Security Commission, 235 Mo. App. 653, November 18, 1940. See also Taylor v. State Social Security Commission. 181 S.W.2d 209, June 19, 1944 (Court of Appeals, Missouri).

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their helpless infancy.”135 In a 1942 case decided by the Missouri Supreme Court in 1942, the justices noted that “The civilized Christian world recognizes a moral obligation resting on the family unit to care for its aged and indigent. The Social Security Act, as amended, does not relieve children, able so to do, of assistance to their aged parents. Rather, it recognizes the moral obligation.”136 Court justices would not overturn an agency’s decision if the facts supported its finding and the law’s provisions, often arguing that its role was not to enact law but only to ensure it was followed, as in the Moore and Buettner cases. If recipients or families had fault with the policies, rather than their application, the courts often offered little relief. Court decisions differed on whether OAA was assistance or a right, a critical issue for responsible relative law debates. The 1941 Howlett decision in Missouri clearly stated that OAA was a “gratuity,” granted to those aged individuals who demonstrate need. The legislature outlined what income was included or not in the 1939 law, and the court directed people who questioned those categories to take that up with the legislature, and not the courts.137 In contrast, a Washington trial court affirmed that its state law, also passed in 1939, clearly established “grants of old age assistance to persons or individuals as a matter of right, and not upon the basis of need.”138 Legislators reinstated responsible relative laws in a 1939 law, but the support requirement was eliminated via Initiative 141 in 1940, a provision introduced and promoted by the WPU.139 The court ruling echoed the initiative’s assertion that OAA was a pension and a right. Rulings varied based on a state’s laws, so a court in one jurisdiction could rule very differently than another. 135

Smith v. State Social Security Commission, 153 S.W.2d 714, July 8, 1941 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 136 Nichols v. State Social Security Commission, 349 Mo. 1148, September 8, 1942 (Supreme Court, Missouri). 137 Howlett v. State Social Security Commission, 347 Mo. 784, March 22, 1941 (State Supreme Court, Missouri). 138 Conant v. State, 4 Wn.2d 301, June 12, 1940 (State Supreme Court, Washington). 139 Washington State Research Council, Public Assistance in Washington State, 1958: An Analysis (Washington State Research Council, 1958): 11; Richard Nelson et al., “Relative Responsibility and Reimbursement in Old Age Assistance: The Responsible Relative, Lien, and Recovery Provisions for Old Age Assistance in Fifty-Two Jurisdictions, Some of Their Effects, and Search for Related Variables.” Master’s Thesis, University of Washington, 1960, 9–11. The 1947 law also reinstated a lien law, and the WPU led the effort to reverse the law in Initiative 172 in 1948. See Yarnell, “Pension Politics in Washington State, 1948.” The Pacific Northwest Quarterly. 61.3 (1970):147–148.

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In another Missouri case, Amos Hardy sought relief from the courts for the support provided by his children after his OAA grant was canceled upon reinvestigation in 1942. A daughter who lived with them and a son in the army, who provided a monthly allotment of $30 to his mother, covered what the OAA grant had not, but the agency found sufficient resources without the assistance. Hardy said he did not have enough money to meet his expenses but had not told his children “as it was too much of a burden upon the family income.” The majority of his support came from a nineteen-year-old daughter who worked at the local telephone company. Hardy’s attorney “with convincing earnestness, argue[d] that it is a great hardship on applicant’s nineteen-year-old daughter to bear the burden of family support at her age, merely because of her loyalty to, and filial affection for her family.” The court ruling noted that it might agree based on the evidence, but that was not the court’s role.140 They also again reiterated that OAA “was a creature of the statute and not a right the claimant may demand.”141 The justices recognized the burden that such support placed on adult children but would not overrule an agency that decided a case in conformity with the state’s law. Hardy’s children were left to support their parents fully. Saul and Ella Hooks sought court intervention in their case due to too little support and abusive behavior by their son and daughter-in-law. In this case, justices found that their support did not conform to the law’s requirement of “decency and health.” The Hooks lived with their son, Richard, in St. Louis, Missouri, when Saul Hooks applied for OAA. The agency denied his application, arguing that the Hooks’ son was supporting them. The 1942 decision included testimony by Saul Hooks, who said that his son often only allowed his parents to eat after Richard and his wife were finished when “there ain’t much left.” The parents did not get along with their son and his wife, and testified that their son asked them to leave the house and their daughter-in-law had “cursed and struck him.” When asked if Richard provided enough groceries, Ella Hooks responded: “No, sir, he don’t buy anything extra. We just get enough to keep us alive. Just enough to keep body and soul together.”142 The court decision noted that 140

Hardy v. State Social Security Commission, 187 S.W.2d 520, May 2, 1945 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). See also Burgfield v. State Social Security Commission, 155 S.W.2d 273, November 4, 1941 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 141 Hardy v. State Social Security Commission, 187 S.W.2d 520, May 2, 1945 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 142 Hooks v. State Social Security Commission, 165 S.W.2d 267, November 4, 1942 (Court of Appeals, Missouri).

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the legislature wisely included some measure of what constituted support, “below which indigent aged persons should not be required to fall.” No one disputed the facts presented, and that “[Hooks] was not possessed of nor was he receiving from anyone sufficient food or clothing to enable him to subsist in a manner ‘compatible with decency and health.’” They faulted the commission for failing to enforce that standard and reversed the denial of benefits.143 Hooks was able to use the court to gain some independence from a son who was reluctant to provide support and with whom life was clearly difficult if not unsafe. In the case of William Nichols, appeals court justices also questioned if family support reached the measure of “decency and health.” Nichols’ daughter and son-in-law testified that they provided for Nichols’ needs for ten years. Nichols, a seventy-year-old man of color, suffered from several medical ailments and was unable to work. David Cooper, the claimant’s son-in-law, said that they were meeting their family needs and those of Nichols, stating that “we haven’t suffered.” The circuit court questioned if Nichols’ support was at the level of “decency and health,” given the vague evidence regarding actual support, and expressed concern that Nichols’ medical needs were not being met. They returned the case to the local agency for reconsideration.144 The agency appealed, and the Supreme Court justices affirmed the local agency’s decision. The applicant, the court stated, had the burden of proof to demonstrate need. Given the testimony, the court ruled that Nichols was not eligible, upholding the denial of aid.145 What is missing from the court record is why Nichols pursued court action, given the testimony of his daughter and son-in-law. Was he trying to save them the financial burden of his support, or did he feel unsafe in their care? None of his testimony, if any was provided in the case, is included in the decision. In another Missouri case, the appeals court ruled in favor of a daughter and son-in-law who argued that they could no longer support Louise Gaeckler, the daughter’s mother. The local agency denied her OAA application, and the decision was upheld in a fair hearing. The denial was based on a life insurance policy with an alleged value of $1,000. Investigation found that the value was slightly more than $500, which the local agency 143

Hooks v. State Social Security Commission. The Court of Appeals was divided in its decision and thus sent the case to the Supreme Court without ruling on the Circuit Court’s decision. Nichols v. State Social Security Commission, 156 S.W.2d 760, December 1, 1941 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 145 Nichols v. State Social Security Commission, 349 Mo. 1148, September 8, 1942 (Supreme Court, Missouri). 144

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argued was over the limit of assets. The beneficiary of the policy was the daughter and son-in-law, who had paid the premiums when no other children would do so, and none would contribute to their mother’s support. Gaeckler had significant medical bills – “between five and eight hundred dollars and going in the hole all the time,” according to the son-in -law. The couple had supported the mother for twelve years, but simply could no longer financially do so; it was not a question of an unwillingness to do so, but the son-in-law stated “it is impossible for me to do so.”146 The appeals court confirmed the lower court ruling reversing the commission’s decision, in part due to the medical needs of Mrs. Gaeckler: “the story told by the record in this case presents a pathetic story of privation and misfortunes of a kindly son-in-law and a dutiful daughter trying to keep the wolf from the door and doing their duty as best they could to an aged and indigent parent.” The couple’s financial circumstances, and not a lack of will, had prevented them from providing their mother with a standard of living “compatible with decency and health.”147 The courts were willing to intervene when children could no longer support an aging parent, despite their best efforts. Minnie Dunnavant was unsuccessful in her efforts to relieve her daughter of the burden of her support. Dunnavant was denied OAA in March 1940 by the local agency in Boonville, Missouri, as it determined her daughter, despite hardship, was providing for her mother; justices felt that the support met “decency and health” standards. The lower court reversed, arguing that the daughter was not able to meet the needs of her mother. In its ruling, the appeals court decision recognized the efforts of the daughter, using language similar to the previous case: “There is also evidence to the effect that the daughter, confronted with conditions that made it a task to keep the wolf from the door, has been faithful to every moral obligation of a child to a parent and has in the past and is at the present” providing sufficient support for her mother. They recognized her efforts, but within the law, found that the support was sufficient, and reversed the lower court ruling, thus sustaining the denial of benefits.148

146

Gaeckler v. State Social Security Commission, 236 Mo. App. 541, November 3, 1941 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 147 Gaeckler v. State Social Security Commission. 148 Dunnavant v. State Social Security Commission, 235 Mo. App. 1107, May 5, 1941 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). See also McBee v. State Social Security Commission, 188 S.W.2d 349, June 11, 1945 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Oliver v. State Social Security Commission, 184 S.W.2d 774, January 9, 1945 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Price v. State Social Security Commission, October 24, 1938 (Court of Appeals, Missouri).

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A California Supreme Court ruling in 1942 affirmed the right of parents to decide where they lived and with whom, despite an adult child’s willingness to house them. The court ruled that while state law could require that an adult child contribute to the support of a parent, it did not require aged parents to live in a son or daughter’s home rather than receive OAA in their home. In 1942, Greta La Fuente was ordered to repay $738 in OAA paid to her parents, Parker and Isa Gray, because she was able to contribute to their support from her salary as a teacher. La Fuente did not contest her ability to pay but argued that because she offered to take her parents in and support them before they applied for OAA, she was not legally obligated to repay the OAA because they were never eligible. She asked their case worker to deny them assistance as she would house and support them. Her parents refused her offer as “we have never gotten along in our lives, and we could not get along.” The couple cared for a special needs child and did not want to subject her to La Fuente or remove her from their home.149 The justices ruled against La Fuente, arguing that the law provided benefits for anyone eligible who was in need and “that such aid shall be provided to every applicant in his home, if possible.” They further noted that parents were not required to live with children with whom they had conflicts: “Certainly the state may provide a needy aged person with a certain measure of independence and happiness of mind, in addition to physical security.” Whether such a policy was the appropriate course, the justices ruled, was a question for the legislature and not the courts. They upheld the order that La Fuente repay the agency for the OAA her parents received.150 This echoes the Missouri court’s decision in the Hooks case, where justices saw both the limited support and family conflict as reasons for the OAA grant. Justices were not explicit about the right of Hooks and his wife to have some independence from their son, but their attention to minimal support standards had the same result. Both claimants avoided dependence on their adult children, although for different reasons. The question of sons-in-law as responsible relatives, discussed earlier in the chapter, was addressed by some court decisions, although rarely directly. Under California’s community property law, a daughter and sonin-law were only required to provide support for the daughter’s parents if she had independent income. The case County of Contra Costa v. Lasky 149

County of Los Angeles v. Greta La Fuente, 20 Cal. 2d870, September 29, 1942 (Supreme Court, California); Tani, States of Dependency, 136. 150 County of Los Angeles v. Greta La Fuente.

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(1954) again highlights California’s law regarding a son-in-law’s support, but from the standpoint of alimony paid to an ex-wife and daughter. The county board of supervisors determined that Frances Lasky was able to provide support for her mother, and the trial court ruled that she could pay $75. She was ordered to refund the county $225 for the three months of OAA it had paid her mother. Her sole income was alimony from her former husband – $660.60 per month. In its ruling, the California Supreme Court found that she was not liable for her mother’s support as the alimony was a continuation of the husband’s support of her and his child, and did not constitute her separate income: “Thus if he is not responsible for his wife’s parents’ support during marriage he should not be after the divorce where his funds he pays to his ex-wife are the same as he would use to support her during marriage.” Lasky had no liability for her mother’s support as her ex-husband did not, based on the state’s community property laws.151 The consideration of son-in-law’s support depended on state policy – another geographic variation in administration. While California only considered income earned by the daughter, Missouri’s courts ruled that such support did count, as in the Nichols and Buettner cases. Washington’s Supreme Court justices reached a similar conclusion in a 1941 case. Sanna Adams was receiving a $14 OAA grant, a portion of which ($8–10) she paid to her daughter and son-in-law for household expenses. She was not paying for any lodging, and thus the agency canceled the grant as relatives were providing her housing. Under a revised 1938 state law, such support was considered a resource to be considered in determining eligibility for OAA. Adams testified that “the way it is now I am sure of food but it isn’t very pleasant.” The justices affirmed the cancellation of Sanna Adams’ OAA grant, pointing to the law’s requirement that all resources be considered. One justice dissented, however, arguing that the 1939 law never specifically lists a son-in-law as a responsible relative (or a daughter-in-law) which indicates that legislators did not intend them to be considered responsible relatives. The other justices did not agree and upheld the relatives’ contributions as a resource.152 As with fair hearings, disputes over property transfers were a significant part of the court cases involving responsible relatives. The courts did not always rule in the favor of the claimant, but the cases provided applicants 151

County of Contra Costa v. Lasky, 43 Cal. 2d 506, October 22, 1954 (Supreme Court, California). 152 Adams v. Ernst, 10 Wn.2d 640, October 10, 1941 (Supreme Court, Washington).

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with an opportunity to contest the decision of the local agency which often centered on intent – did the applicant transfer property to a family member to make themselves eligible for OAA – as in the case of fair hearings. Cases in Missouri again constitute the bulk of the cases found and demonstrate that the burden of evidence rested on the agency. Suspicions of such intent were not enough for the appeals court in several cases, and too little evidence for such intent often resulted in a ruling in favor of the claimant. Several recipients contested the evidence offered by agencies in their denial or cancellation of grants – or the interpretation of the evidence presented. In a series of cases in Missouri’s courts of appeals, justices ruled that while there might be “suspicion” that the transfer of property was to gain eligibility for OAA benefits, evidence did not support that intent. In the case of Marion Myers in Kirksville, Missouri, Myers gave a note to his daughter in 1930 for $1,000 against his farm’s value for her years of work after his first wife died. He had remarried and wanted to ensure that she received some payment for the care and labor she provided. She received the funds when he sold the property in 1940. Myers had applied for OAA in 1939 and 1940 and was denied because of the value of his property and the intended transfer; the local agency did not see the note as evidence of a debt to his daughter.153 In his testimony, Myers used the word “estate” which the fair hearing officer interpreted as ensuring his daughter received the property separate from the care provided. (Myers was not represented by any legal counsel.) The court disagreed, as that was the only evidence presented that spoke to the local agency and state’s interpretation of the intent. The court decision acknowledged that while the circumstances of the case “might give rise to a suspicion that plaintiff might have fraudulently transferred the note in order to make himself eligible for old age assistance,” it was not substantial evidence.154 The justices’ language was even stronger in the case of Coma Davis, whose OAA grant was canceled in March 1953. Davis transferred the property to his daughter after his daughter paid part of the mortgage and funded much-needed repairs. As with Myers, Davis transferred the property to pay a debt he owed to his daughter for the repairs. She later sold the property and after the mortgage and other debts were paid, received $1,200, far less, she testified, than what she had spent on the property.

153

Myers v. State Social Security Commission, 181 S.W.2d 565, June 19, 1944 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 154 Myers v. State Social Security Commission. See also Howell v. State Department, 249 S.W.2d 863, May 5, 1952 (Court of Appeals, Missouri).

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Mr. Davis testified that he had given no thought to qualifying for OAA, but when he tried to communicate that to the case workers “they didn’t want to understand me.”155 The court of appeals justices agreed that such transactions warranted scrutiny by public welfare officials, and it was also typical that in most families the burden of care of an elderly parent falls on one of the children. In most cases, the court stated, people do not keep careful records and that alone is not evidence: “What we do say is that, a consideration having been shown, the smelly finger of suspicion should not be pointed at those who might have motives of filial love and devotion above and beyond that of reimbursement, repayment or even private gain, and so and for such reason an inference drawn from the transaction which, as between strangers, would go unquestioned.”156 Missouri’s state law permitted a consideration of intent, and did not deem property transfers an automatic reason to deny OAA. In these cases, and others, claimants successfully used the courts to demonstrate the limited evidence of intent on which local and state agency decisions rested, and were thus eligible for OAA benefits. Organizations and individuals resisted the application of responsible relative laws, countering arguments by their proponents regarding obligations to support aging and financially needy parents. The CCOAP, later the CISW, was a key voice in these debates, and continually vexed those seeking to contain public assistance costs in California. The CCOAP, the WPU, and the Illinois OAA advocacy group encouraged recipients to use the fair hearing process to contest denials, grant reductions, and cancellations. Challenges to responsible relative provisions were not only the purview of organizations. Applicants, recipients, and their families challenged these provisions via correspondence, fair hearings, and court cases. The drive for economic security for OAA recipients then produced

155

Davis v. State Department of Health and Welfare, 274 S.W.2d 615, January 5, 1955 (Court of Appeals, Missouri). 156 Davis v. State Department of Health and Welfare. Other cases focused on property transfers include Choate v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare, 296 S.W.2d 189, November 21, 1956 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Cook v. State Social Security Commission, 183 S.W.2d 153, November 6, 1944 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Morris v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare, 504 S.W.2d 170, January 17, 1974 (State Supreme Court, Missouri); Norman v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare, October 17, 1955 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Powers v. State Department of Public Welfare, 359 S.W.2d 23, June 4, 1962 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Underwood v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare, February 7, 1956 (Court of Appeals, Missouri); Velghe v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare, December 3, 1962 (Court of Appeals, Missouri).

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a movement to reduce those costs, usually in defense of the taxpayer. Debates over responsible relative laws illuminate the disagreement over who should provide support for the aged, and clearly demonstrate that money and taxation were at the center of those debates. In this context, the “taxpayer” was the individual whose federal and state taxes funded public assistance programs, in the eyes of proponents of responsible relative laws. Containing public assistance costs limited that tax burden on individuals. For opponents, the “taxpayer” was the elderly American in need to financial assistance after a lifetime of labor and parenting that earned them such support. Confusion over payroll taxes also led some to believe that those taxes funded OAA, and not OASI. The next chapter moves to survivor benefits under the latter program, which included benefits for aging parents. In this context, the “taxpayer” was the worker who died before qualifying for benefits, but whose payroll tax contributions entitled survivors to benefits, including parents.

3 Aging Parents and Survivor Benefits The Challenge of Proving Dependency

Nancy Houghton applied for survivor benefits in 1951 after her son died one day after moving into an apartment he had rented to share with his mother. Her daughter and son-in-law supported her for several years, supplemented with her $35 monthly Old Age Assistance (OAA) grant. Her son was eligible for Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI), and on that basis she applied for survivor benefits as his dependent parent. The initial review of her case found that the apartment rental and his plan to assume support of his mother “shows his intent to support [his mother] on a continuing and permanent basis, and that she was dependent upon him for a reasonable period just before his death.”1 The law stated that such support should occur for a “reasonable period of time” but the meaning of that phrase was not defined. Those reviewing her application argued that her application should be approved given the clear intent to support, despite her son’s untimely death just one day after his mother moved in with him. A review of the application by Perrin Lowrey, assistant director of OASI, argued that more information was needed to determine what the level of support was needed and if it met the threshold in the law of providing one-half of her support. He believed much of the case was based on conjecture rather than facts pointing to support in part because it was not clear if the daughter intended to continue to provide some support even if her mother was no longer living with her. “Accordingly we suggest you develop to ascertain [sic] what percentage of his

1

Memo to Area Office, Kansas City, from Perrin Lowrey, Division of Claims Policy, July 30, 1951, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951, NA-CP.

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mother’s support the wage earner furnished just before his death,” to determine if it met the required one-half.2 The point of contention was demonstrating that the mother was financially dependent on the son to the level required by the OASI program. OASI under the Social Security Act was the cornerstone of the federal government’s program to ensure that Americans over sixty-five had some measure of economic security in their later years. Deeply limited by occupational exclusions in 1935, the program offered the promise of benefits to all Americans through the expansion of eligible workers. By 1971, 90 percent of Americans were covered under what was by then Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI).3 The contributory program – funded in part by payroll taxes paid by employees and employers – also evolved to benefit the survivors of workers who contributed to the program but died before receiving benefits. Parents of those workers are an often ignored part of this program, and survivor benefits under OASI are a key piece of parent dependency policies. Houghton’s case illustrates that parent dependency was not presumed but had to be documented; adult children had to meet the one-half support requirement for a parent to qualify for benefits.4 The 1939 amendments to the Social Security Act extended benefits to survivors of workers who contributed to OASI. Widows, children, and parents became eligible for survivor benefits based on the contributions of the deceased worker; in the above case, the worker was Houghton’s son. Scholars, particularly Alice Kessler-Harris, have analyzed survivor benefits for widows and children, but benefits for parents have received less attention.5 The program deliberately implemented different measures of dependency for the three groups. Widows and dependent children Memo to Area Office, July 30, 1951, 2. The file does not indicate what the eventual outcome of the case was. 3 Disability benefits were added in 1956 when the program was renamed Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI). Dependents were eligible for benefits starting in 1958. See Mollie Orshansky, “The Aged Negro and His Income,” Social Security Bulletin. 27.2 (1964): 9; Gayle B. Thompson, “Blacks and Social Security Trends, 1960–1973,” Social Security Bulletin. 38.4 (1975): 30. 4 “Family Benefits under Old-Age and Survivor Insurance, 1949,” Social Security Bulletin. 12.8 (1949): 19. 5 Alice Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity: Women, Men, and the Quest for Economic Citizenship in 20th Century America. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001) and Alice Kessler-Harris, “‘Designing Women and Old Fools’: The Construction of the Social Security Amendments of 1939.” U.S. History as Women’s History. Eds. Linda Kerber, Alice Kessler-Harris, and Kathryn Kish Sklar. (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1995): 87–106. See also Suzanne Mettler, Dividing Citizens: Gender and Federalism in New Deal Public Policy (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998): 97–106. 2

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demonstrated dependency either by living with the deceased worker or relying on contributions from the worker (for a child if the parents were divorced); there was no means test to prove need. Children were presumed dependent, but in cases of shifting support, often due to divorce, whom they were dependent on could require investigation.6 If an eligible worker died leaving no wife or children, the parent or parents of the worker, if they were sixty-five, could be eligible for benefits comparable to that received by a child, but “only if the parent was wholly dependent upon the deceased at the time of death” in the original 1939 amendments to the program.7 Depending on the number of years the worker contributed to the program, a parent might receive anywhere from $10 to $14 monthly.8 While not enough to provide full support, such benefits could be an important supplement to an aged parent’s income. The introduction documented the poverty rates among elderly today and the number of aged Americans relying on both OAA and OASI for support; even small benefits under OASI could make a critical difference in the living standard of an aged parent. Survivor benefits represent a middle ground in scholars’ understanding of the contributory and public assistance tracks. Survivor benefits were not earned by the direct recipient but were awarded in the interest of equity on the part of the worker – the adult child of the parent receiving benefits. Although survivor benefits served a relatively small number of aged Americans, in comparison to those who earned benefits via their own employment, they demonstrate how family and understandings of dependence operated in these debates and the subsequent Social Security Administration (SSA). Although never a program that served a significant number of aged in need, survivor benefits for parents, once dependency was established, placed recipients in the contributory track of social policy. Those deemed eligible for survivor benefits avoided the annual investigations by OAA case workers, unless they were also receiving OAA benefits. Access to survivor benefits moved recipients into the realm of contributory or “earned” benefits, absent the stigma associated with continued investigations in OAA. 6

Exceptions to this will be addressed later in the chapter. The dependency threshold was reduced to 50 percent in the 1950 Social Security Amendments. Social Security Amendments of 1939: Senate Finance Committee Report, July 7, 1939 (New York: Commerce Clearing House, 1939) 11; “Federal Old-age and Survivors Insurance: A Summary of the 1939 Amendments,” Social Security Bulletin. 2.12 (1939): 12. 8 These values are $212 and $296, respectively, in 2022 dollars. 7

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Structural inequities in the OASI system continued to limit the number of beneficiaries of color, which meant that fewer parents of color had access to survivor benefits via their children. Occupational exclusions prevented many workers from gaining access to the program, although those exclusions lessened by the 1950s. Domestic and household workers gained inclusion to OASI in 1951, when “household employment” became a covered occupation. Ninety percent were women and more than half were black people; 90 percent of black household workers were women.9 Farm workers were included in the program in the 1950 amendments but loosened restrictions in 1954 brought 2.8 million more workers into the program – four times the original number in 1950. Ninety percent of all farm workers were now included in OASI; migrant workers, noncitizen workers with temporary status, and those who were employed less consistently (housewives, children, and semiretired persons) continued to be excluded from coverage.10 Once covered under OASI via occupation, workers had to gain the required number of qualifying quarters (based on hours and income) to be eligible for benefits – or for their dependents to be eligible. The number of black beneficiaries steadily increased in the 1950s and 1960s with the inclusion of more occupations but the numbers were significantly lower than for white recipients. About 80 percent of all Americans of color received OASI cash benefits (across all programs, including retired workers and survivors) in 1973 compared to 92 percent of whites, and black recipients comprised 10 percent of the total number of beneficiaries that year, twice the 5 percent of black beneficiaries who received benefits in 1960 (49 percent of all black Americans over sixty-five received benefits that year).11 In 1973, just 53 percent of black recipients were retired workers, their wives, or aged widows (compared to 77 percent Herbert R. Tacker, “Household Employment under OASDHI, 1951–66,” Social Security Bulletin. 33.6 (1970): 10–11. 10 James E. Marquis, “Old-Age and Survivors Insurance: Coverage under the 1954 Amendments.” Social Security Bulletin. 18.1 (1955): 6; Charles I. Schottland, “Social Security Amendments of 1956: A Summary and Legislative History.” Social Security Bulletin. 19.8 (1956): 6. 11 More than 90 percent of all non-white individuals in the OASI program were black people in the 1960s, and thus most of the studies focused on that group when analyzing beneficiaries of color. Black recipients were not a separate category in the statistics until 1968, and Thompson argues that the statistics for the “black and other” category “show very small differences between blacks alone and blacks and other races combined” in the years analyzed. Thompson, “Blacks and Social Security Benefits: Trends, 1960–1973,” 30–31. See also Orshansky, “The Aged Negro and His Income,” 3–4. For a discussion of race and social security statistics, see Patricia P. Martin, “Why Researchers Now Rely on 9

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of white recipients). Children of color comprised nearly a third of all nonwhite beneficiaries in 1955 and the majority were the children of deceased insured workers. Younger black workers were more likely to be eligible for benefits than elderly black workers, accounting for the greater numbers among younger black Americans usually via the disability or survivor benefit programs.12

the creation of survivor benefits Members of the Committee on Economic Security were the key architects of the Social Security Act; Barbara Armstrong, J. Douglas Brown, and Murray Latimer were the staff members tasked with designing benefits for the elderly, including OAI. Edwin Witte, then president of the University of Wisconsin, headed the CES staff, and both he and Brown would play significant roles in the 1937 Advisory Council recommending survivor benefits. Brown and Armstrong were both academics: Brown was an economist at Princeton University and Armstrong taught at the University of California, Berkeley. Latimer’s background was designing pension plans for private companies. Armstrong, Brown, and Latimer all favored a contributory program for OAI, although Witte did not, prioritizing unemployment compensation over OAI. All rejected the concept of a flat pension advocated by other groups, including Frances Townsend and Huey Long, in part due to opposition to the dependency associated with relief programs. Instead, they argued for benefits based in part on the contributions paid into the system via a payroll tax.13 Arthur Altmeyer, later administrator for the Social Security Board, also was a key participant in the CES and debates over survivor benefits and the 1939 amendments. Survivor benefits (OASI) were added to the Social Security Act in 1939 to address the growing surplus of funds that fostered declining support for the program. Payroll taxes were accumulating steadily, but the payment of OAI benefits would not begin until 1942. People were paying into a system that

Surveys for Race Data on OASDI and SSI Programs: A Comparison of Four Major Surveys.” Research and Statistics Note. No. 2016–01. (2016): 2–3. 12 Janet H. Murray, “Old-Age, Survivors, Disability, and Health Insurance: Changes in Beneficiary Population,” Social Security Bulletin. 32.4 (1969): 32; Thompson, “Blacks and Social Security Benefits,” 32. 13 Edward D. Berkowitz, America’s Welfare State, from Roosevelt to Reagan (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991): 15–16, 19–20; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 121–126; Jill Quadagno, The Transformation of Old Age Security (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1988): 110–112.

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was providing no immediate benefits.14 Benefits for widows and dependent children were the focus of these discussions, and parents received minimal attention. Debates over how best to address the surplus of funds, however, highlight the relationship between OASI and OAA. As documented in the introduction, many more elderly Americans received OAA in the first years of the programs, fostering the widespread misconception that OAA was a “pension” rather than a means-tested program. As a result, OAA was much more popular than OAI, but had no contributions to fund it. The federal government’s expenditures for public assistance were three times that of social insurance.15 Early OAI benefits were also lower than OAA grants in some states, and thus old-age insurance was a political target.16 The Social Security Board appointed a twenty-four-member Advisory Council to make recommendations regarding the growing surplus of funds. Brown was appointed chair of the council and would serve on most of the advisory councils related to the Social Security Act until 1972.17 Twelve members came from labor and business, and another twelve were listed as “public” participants. Included in the latter group were academics and business professionals. Witte was part of this group, as were three women.18 The Council, which met for eighteen months beginning in 1938, offered ten recommendations regarding benefits; 14

Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 131–132; W. Andrew Achenbaum, Social Security: Visions and Revisions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986): 30–32; Edward Berkowitz and Kim McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State: The Political Economy of Twentieth-Century Reform (Lawrence, MA: University Press of Kansas, 1992): 130–132; Martha Derthick, Policymaking for Social Security (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1979): 142–144; Quadagno, The Transformation of Old Age Security, 120–121. 15 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 131–132; Achenbaum, Social Security: Visions and Revisions, 28–31; Berkowitz and McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State, 130–133; Julian E. Zelizer, Taxing America: Wilbur D. Mills, Congress and the State, 1945–1970 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998): 67. 16 Brian Gratton, “The New Welfare State: Social Security and Retirement in 1950,” Social Science History. 12.2 (Summer 1988): 173; Mettler, Dividing Citizens, 115; Berkowitz and McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State, 176–177. Berkowitz argues that a central concern of Jane Hoey, director of the Bureau of Public Assistance, was that OAA benefits would be viewed as a pension, collapsing “the distinction between welfare (noncontributory) and social insurance (contributory)” (176). 17 Brown remained a significant force in the SSA for several decades. Martha Derthick argues that he was key to the councils’ functions; “he was perceived to be neutral politically. Everyone trusted him.” See Achenbaum, Social Security: Visions and Revisions, 39, 73, 143; Berkowitz and McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State, 119–120; Derthick, Policymaking for Social Security, 100–103; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 122. 18 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 132–134. The women included Theresa McMahon, a professor at the University of Washington, and social work professor Elizabeth Wisner. Lucy Randolph Mason, president of the National Consumers League, was the third but

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several recommendations addressed the inclusion of widows and surviving children in the extension of benefits under the survivor provisions.19 In contrast to benefits for widows and dependent children, the inclusion of parents in survivor benefits received virtually no attention from the Advisory Council.20 Benefits for parents deemed dependent on deceased workers were not in their recommendations, and the minutes of the Advisory Council meetings were largely silent on that issue. No one on the council proposed adding parents to the survivor program. The council’s deliberations considered the relationship between the OAA and OAI programs – extending benefits in the latter would reduce the demand on the former. A key reason to raise the level of benefits under OAI was to address the adequacy issue: early payments were low and prompted some beneficiaries to turn to OAA to supplement their OAI benefits. As OAI, and later OASI, served more Americans, the reliance on OAA did diminish, but often recipients received benefits from both programs because OASI benefits were inadequate for full support. In 1948, about 6 percent of OAA recipients also received OASI. The numbers varied by states, from a low of less than 1 percent in Kentucky to 14.3 percent in Massachusetts. Even in 1960, 6.7 percent of OASI recipients also received OAA, and 28.6 percent of OAA recipients also received OASI benefits.21 The effects of occupational exclusions in the OASI program are evident for black recipients. In 1952, just 15.5 percent of black male OAA recipients also received OASI benefits, and even fewer black women on OAA also received OASI – 5.7 percent. Overall, white OAA recipients qualified for OASI at nearly twice the rate of black recipients: 19.3 versus 10.2 percent.22 A 1968 study found that nearly one-third of all widow beneficiaries with lower benefits also relied on OAA; this reflects the larger trend that those among the lowest tier of benefits also received OAA.23 resigned before the council met. Josephine Roche, an assistant secretary in the US Treasury Department, was her replacement. 19 Social Security Amendments of 1939, 9–12. 20 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 132–134. 21 “Public Assistance Supplementation of the Income of Old-Age and Survivor Insurance Beneficiaries,” Social Security Bulletin. 12.10 (1949): 14; Alvin L. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family (Washington, DC: US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, 1960): 22; Robert H. Mugge, “Concurrent Receipt of Public Assistance and Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance,” Social Security Bulletin. 23.12 (1960): 12, 14. 22 Charles F. Hawkins, “Old-Age Assistance Recipients: Reasons for Nonentitlement to Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Benefits,” Social Security Bulletin. 15.7 (1952): 8–9. 23 Patience Lauriat, “Benefit Levels and Socio-economic Characteristics: Findings from the 1968 Survey of the Aged,” Social Security Bulletin. 33.8 (1970): 7.

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Council members recognized that both programs were important in addressing the financial needs of aging Americans, but they did not see survivor benefits as another way to ensure adequate resources for parents. Survivor benefits for parents were not specifically discussed by the council, but it did recognize the larger issue of the financial needs of aged Americans. Brown cited a study by the SSA that found that threequarters of persons over the age of sixty-five were dependent, and 70 percent relied on support from relatives and friends. Public and private programs addressed the needs of the remainder. Brown stated: “I don’t think we ought to play down the degree of dependence on the part of old people.”24 The discussion occurred within the conversation of extending benefits to children, rather than parents, and the council presented no discussion or proposal to include parents. The Advisory Council and the SSA’s conceptualization of family as the nuclear family, with extended family ties playing only a secondary role, shaped the understanding of parent dependency that emerged in the survivor benefits. This reinforces Kessler-Harris’ analysis of the “power of gendered worldviews” embedded in the council’s deliberations and recommendations “by shaping the parameters within which people see.”25 Brown described the program’s philosophy as a focus on the “protection of the family unit,” which fully emerged, he argued, in the 1939 amendments.26 The council’s family norm was the nuclear family with traditional gender roles, a view shared by other federal officials, including Social Security Administrator Arthur Altmeyer. Altmeyer, like Brown, was an economist. Admired by employees for his quiet leadership, he was known as “Mr. Social Security.”27 Altmeyer defended the concept of a traditional family as the basis for the program. If a man was single, he likely would someday marry and have children, and his family would be covered by the survivor benefits. 24

Advisory Council Minutes, April 29, 1938, 20, Box 13, Folder 025, Federal Advisory Council Minutes, Records of the Social Security Board, Chairman’s File, RG 47.3, National Archives, College Park, MD (hereafter cited as NA-CP); Marjorie Shearon, “Economic Status of the Aged.” Social Security Bulletin. 1.1 (1938): 6, 16. 25 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 6. 26 J. Douglas Brown, An American Philosophy of Social Security Evolution and Issues (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1972): 141–142. Brown argues that the addition of parents as survivors, if a deceased worker left no other survivors, was evidence of that shift. 27 Blanche Coll, Safety Net: Welfare and Social Security, 1929–1979 (New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1995): 56; Derthick, Policymaking for Social Security, 19–20; Berkowitz and McQuaid, Creating the Welfare State, 129–130. Derthick and Berkowitz and McQuaid quote Altmeyer: “So I have said many times that a successful administrator ought to be about as interesting as spinach – cold spinach at that.”

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Altmeyer argued, “So it is a family concept. You just cannot think of these people as individuals. You have to think of them in their family relationships. Likewise the single man or single woman is relieved of the responsibility of helping a widowed sister, we will say, who is left with a number of children. The whole thing ties in together, we think, to furnish a better pattern of protection to all of the people who are covered under the insurance system.”28 Framing benefits around the nuclear family would relieve a single man of other obligations, such as a widowed sister, as she would be covered under her husband’s benefits. Kessler-Harris argues that “in adopting the program, Congress accepted, with little debate, the relatively rigid definition of family it demanded.”29 Thus aged wives and widows with young children were covered, but aged husbands and widowers were not, even those with small children. When aged husbands and widowers became eligible for their wife’s benefits in 1961, they, like parents, had to prove dependency.30 Parents who relied on adult children for support were also outside the family norms underscoring the Advisory Council’s debates. The council’s discussions centering on provision for widows supported by single sons reveal assumptions about gender and family support. Altmeyer suggested that many widows would be covered by their husband’s benefits under the proposed amendments. He did acknowledge that not all would be: “I think you would get a small residual number of widows without protection, and if you undertake to take care of widowed mothers you would be increasing your benefits and introducing an entirely new category. There is no system of social insurance that I know of in effect that does undertake to take care of widowed mothers as such.”31 What Altmeyer did not address was the significant number of workers, including domestic and farm workers, not covered under OAI or by the 1939 amendments. Not all widows would be covered under their husbands’ benefits because not all workers were included in the program; this was particularly true for workers of color who likely labored in an excluded occupation. The “small residual number” – which was not small – would have to turn to OAA.32 Advisory Hearings Relative to the Social Security Amendments of 1939 before the Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives, Volume 3, 76th Congress, First Session (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1939): 2199. See also Berkowitz, America’s Welfare State, 47–48. 29 30 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 141. Ibid., 141, 167. 31 Hearings Relative to the Social Security Amendments of 1939, Volume 3, 2209–2210. 32 Ira Katznelson, When Affirmative Action Was White: An Untold History of Racial Inequality in Twentieth-Century America (New York: W. W. Norton, 2005): 42–44; Michael K. Brown, Race, Money, and the American Welfare State (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999): 70–71; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 130–131. 28

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Council members did consider the needs of widows under sixty-five, who were not eligible for survivor benefits, but argued, again invoking their vision of family, that “[Widows] are likely to have more savings than younger widows and many of them would have children who are grown and able to help them.”33 These discussions also demonstrate a key conceptual link between survivor benefits and responsible relative laws: the presumption that extended family members – including adult children – could and should provide support. As analyzed in Chapters 1 and 2, states with responsible relative laws required adult children to provide support to aging parents before they could qualify for OAA; if support was available, grants might be reduced or an elderly applicant deemed ineligible. In survivor benefits, a widow could be expected to have a child willing to take her into his or her home, and the adult son or daughter should be willing to house the mother. Whether public programs should replace family support was raised when Brown highlighted the issue of parent dependency. When another member responded that “We don’t want to substitute Government support for family support,” Brown noted that often those providing support were also of limited means and had their own children: “We don’t want to disregard the fact that any benefit to them as old persons in itself is a proper protection to the second and third generation.”34 In discussing the different kinds of income aging Americans received, which would exclude them from eligibility for OAA, Edwin Witte identified family support as a key source: “there is the fact that large numbers of people are still being supported by their children and should continue to be supported by their children.”35 Despite the council’s recognition that adult children were providers for aging Widows whose children were 18 or would reach that age – thus rendering the children and thus the widow ineligible for benefits – before the widow turned 65, faced a period of no benefits, also known as the “widow’s gap.” Council members also assumed they would either reenter employment or remarry. Kessler-Harris argues that this speaks to the council’s focus on male breadwinners, and “the provisions finally adopted suggest that old age insurance was never imagined in terms of fair treatment to women – a product of the joint efforts of a marriage partnership.” Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 135–136. 34 Advisory Council Minutes, April 29 and 30, 1938, 21, Box 13, Folder 025, Federal Advisory Council Minutes, Records of the Social Security Board, Chairman’s File, RG 47.3, NA-CP. Brown highlighted a key criticism of support obligations via responsible relative laws: They tended to fall on those in the lower income brackets. Those with the fewest resources were often asked to support needy parents. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family, 27–30. 35 Advisory Council Minutes, October 22, 1938, 30, Box 13, Folder 025, Federal Advisory Council Minutes, October 21 and 22, 1938, NA-CP. 33

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parents, members remained silent on the inclusion of parents in the survivor benefits in their discussions, ignoring the possibility that a deceased son or daughter might leave behind a parent who depended on their support. The council’s final report acknowledged “that in some instances a single annuitant will need to support an aged dependent relative” but argued that “to make such relatives eligible for allowances would create many administrative problems.”36 The argument about administrative difficulties echoed those made regarding the inclusion of agricultural and domestic workers, who were ultimately excluded from benefits under the 1939 amendments. Council members drew distinctions between OASI benefits and OAA; those eligible for OASI avoided “an inferior social status with a means test,” according to Brown. Another council member called social insurance “the highest type” of benefit, and that “persons should be proud that they had this and they should be the elite.” Those receiving OAA “would be the group a little under them.”37 Council members recognized the stigma connected to OAA, and sought to distinguish the social insurance program from the public assistance program, but chose not to consider the inclusion of parents in the survivor program.38 Once parents were included, if they were able to secure benefits, OASI represented a specific type of social provision, a difference recognized by members of the council. Parents endured an initial means test but then had benefits for the remainder of their life. Despite these comments in their meetings, council members did not consider the inclusion of parents as beneficiaries. They did not fit the nuclear family model that framed most of the council’s deliberations. The Ways and Means Committee of the US House of Representatives added parents to the survivor benefits program, but hearing transcripts and committee minutes are limited in explaining why the committee did so. When the committee does address why, the arguments centered on equity for the deceased male worker who had contributed to the program, rather than support for parents.39 John McCormack, a representative from

36

Advisory Council on Social Security, Final Report of the Advisory Council on Social Security (Washington, DC, 1938): 25. 37 Advisory Council Minutes, February 18, 1938, 40, Box 13, Folder 025, Federal Advisory Council Minutes, Records of the Social Security Board, Chairman’s File, RG 47.3, NA-CP. 38 Advisory Council Minutes, February 18, 1938, 11, Box 13, Folder 025, Federal Advisory Council Minutes, Records of the Social Security Board, Chairman’s File, RG 47.3, NA-CP. 39 Hearings Relative to the Social Security Amendments of 1939 before the Finance Committee, 16; Minutes, House Ways and Means Committee, 76th Congress, Tuesday, May 2, 1939, and Wednesday, May 3, 1939. Brown notes in his 1972 book that Congress

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Massachusetts, emphasized children’s support of their parents in his questions to Altmeyer during the hearings: “What about the single man who has a mother or father dependent on him, or a father? He has his obligations, hasn’t he?” Equity was key for McCormack, who asked, “What about the fellow who has contributed his money and has a mother and father?” McCormack’s concern was the male worker contributing to a program from which, if he died young and single, he would never receive benefits that were earned.40 McCormack’s objections centered on the equity of the program for single male workers, although he situated that in the discussions of dependent parents. McCormack’s arguments regarding equity parallel those made in support of survivor benefits for widows and children, but do not emerge in the Advisory Council meetings. Alice Kessler-Harris argues that extending benefits to widows and surviving children under eighteen ensured that the workers’ dependents would have some income derived from male breadwinners’ contributions during their working lives. The arguments “reinforced the prerogatives and self-images of some males.”41 Widows’ benefits were not based on their own financial contributions to the social security system, and thus their right to the benefits was based upon their presumed dependence on their husband, the male breadwinner. McCormack was making the same claim for a right to benefits for those (male) workers who had supported a parent. An analysis of parents’ benefits produced shortly after the amendments were implemented suggested that equity for workers – ensuring that no insured workers died leaving no one to whom benefits would be paid – was a primary reason for parents’ inclusion in the program. Like McCormack, the report also identified parental support by unmarried insured workers as another argument to extend benefits to parents.42 Embedded in these debates is the larger conversation regarding whether public assistance (particularly OAA) or OASI were the best means to provide support for elderly Americans. The structure of OASI was designed to contrast public assistance in its funding mechanism,

added parents to the survivor benefits program, but does not address why the Advisory Council did not. Brown, An American Philosophy of Social Security, 135. 40 Hearings, Ways and Means Committee, 2207–2208. 41 Kessler-Harris, “‘Designing Women and Old Fools,’” 90–92; quotation on page 92. 42 “Report 20: Parent’s Benefits,” Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951, 2, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject files, 1938– 1961, Records of Bureau of OASI, NA-CP. The report has no date, but given its content and placement in the records it was likely produced in 1941, not long after the survivor benefits were first implemented.

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positioning OASI as an earned benefit. The goal to increase access to OASI and thus reduce dependence on OAA dates to the origins of the nation’s Social Security Act. Debates within “the tax community” of the postWorld War II era focused on preserving the payroll tax system as a means of funding social insurance benefits, in contrast to public assistance programs funded from general tax revenues. Described as an insurance premium paid via payroll taxes, OASI was positioned in clear contrast to OAA and other public assistance programs, a distinction policymakers in both parties emphasized for decades. Long-time House Ways and Means chairperson, Wilbur Mills, favored expanded social insurance benefits over public assistance; throughout his career he “spoke of financing social insurance programs that maintained the ‘traditional family structure.’” He consistently opposed the expansion of public assistance, believing such benefits fostered dependency.43 These beliefs likely motivated his support for inclusion of parents in the survivor benefits, although there is no direct evidence of that link. The difference between the two programs fueled support for OASI while setting the stage for hostility to public assistance programs’ expansion.44 The limited access of parents to survivor benefits, as this chapter shows, meant aged Americans had to turn to other sources of support, including OAA.

military survivor benefits Military survivor benefits also played a role in the inclusion of parents under the survivor benefits program. The report cited in The Creation of Survivor Benefits analyzing parents’ benefits suggested that parents were included because they were also eligible for benefits if their child died or was injured in connection to military service.45 Veterans’ benefits were linked to the war in which a soldier served; the most generous benefits were for those serving in the Civil War. Mothers were eligible for dependent benefits in the 1862 law governing soldiers disabled from war injuries, and fathers were added as the benefit system was liberalized in subsequent decades.46 Benefits were accorded the dependents of veterans of numerous 43

Zelizer, Taxing America, 114, 151–152. Molly C. Michelmore, Tax and Spend: The Welfare State, Tax Politics and the Limits of American Liberalism (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012): 13. 45 “Report 20: Parent’s Benefits,” 2. 46 The 1890 Dependent Pension Act separated injury or disability from war service; any veteran who served honorably was eligible regardless of how the disability occurred. Theda Skocpol argues that benefits became de facto old-age benefits, and a 1906 law 44

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conflicts, from the Civil War to the Spanish–American War to World War I. Parents were eligible for survivor benefits through the military, and for allotments via their adult son or daughter serving in the military. Like social security benefits, parents were only eligible, until 1933, if no widow or children survived the service member. Benefits privileged mothers over fathers; mothers had to be “without adequate support.” A father was eligible, but “his earnings are considered in determining whether he is dependent.”47 In 1942, 82,200 parents received benefits based on their child’s service.48 Military family members did not contribute to these programs but earned them via active military service by their sons and daughters. Benefits for family members were thus linked to equity but based on military service rather than monetary contributions over time. During World War II, parents were also eligible for military allotments paid by their adult child in military service. While allotments for service members with families (spouse and/or children) were compulsory, service members could make a voluntary allotment to a secondary dependent, such as a parent, even while allotments were paid to a spouse or children. Voluntary allotments were matched with government funds. Thus a parent in 1942 would receive $22 from their son or daughter’s pay, and the federal government would contribute an additional $25 for $47.49 Parents had to be dependent on the son or daughter to receive benefits, but until 1954 an affidavit submitted by the service member and the parent was sufficient evidence to prove dependency which was based on a minimum income rather than a percentage of support.50 This would

explicitly recognized old age as a disability under the law. Theda Skocpol, Protecting Soldiers and Mothers: The Political Origins of Social Policy in the United States (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992): 106, 110–111. 47 US House of Representatives, Veterans’ Benefits, 75th Congress, House Document 701 (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1938): 10, 16, 18, 19, 26. 48 A total of 317,000 dependents received military survivor benefits in 1942. One parent was eligible for a monthly payment of $45 ($849 in 2022 dollars), and two parents would receive $25 each ($472 each in 2022 dollars), if their child served during wartime. Service in peacetime meant parents received $30 for one parent ($566 in 2022 dollars) and $20 each for two parents ($377 each in 2022 dollars). Franklin M. Aaronson, “Pensions and Compensation to Veterans and Their Dependents.” Social Security Bulletin. 11 (1942): 15, 21. 49 $22 in 1942 would be $415 in 2022 dollars; $25 would be $471 and $47 would equal $886. D. C. Bronson, “Present Protections and Relief for Members of the Armed Forces.” Social Security Bulletin. 5.12 (1942): 23. 50 State Letter No. 235, 2, Social Security Administration Records, Bureau of Public Assistance, State Letters, Box 1, Folder 2, NA-CP; Letter to Victor Christigan from Ewall Bartlett dated July 26, 1955, 1, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent,

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change when military service members gained inclusion in the OASI program. Members of the military were among the groups excluded from the original Social Security Act of 1935. They gained partial inclusion in 1946, receiving wage credits of $160 per month of service in the military. Under the 1950 amendments, those serving in the military from 1940 to 1947 (later extended to 1955) were given a $160 wage credit for each month served for the purposes of calculating OASI benefits, either for the service member or survivors.51 The credits were retroactive to the war period (1940–47). The goal was to ensure that those serving in the military, particularly noncareer military, would have a continuous record of wage credits for OASI benefit calculation. Service members who elected to receive these benefits were not also eligible for military retirement benefits. This change included military members in the OASI system for the first time.52 Service members were included in the OASI system on a contributory basis – like all other employees in the program – in 1956 under the Servicemen’s and Veterans’ Survivor Benefits Act. It also allowed veterans and their survivors to receive both OASI and military retirement and survivor benefits.53 A key difference from OASI was that while parents had to pass a means test to receive survivor benefits, the military benefit rules did not require a certain level of support from the son or daughter serving in the military.54 The concept of “dependency” was included in the proposed 1952–; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, NA-CP. 51 A $160 wage credit in 1942 equaled about $3,019 in 2022 dollars; in 1950 that amount was worth $2,017 in 2022 dollars. 52 US House of Representatives, Survivor Benefits: Report of the Select Committee on Survivor Benefits, 83rd Congress, Second Session, House Report No. 2682, Part I (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1954): 3–4, 8; Appendix C, 21–22; Social Security Act, Amendments of 1950, section 217, Benefits to Veterans, www.ssa.gov/OP_Home/ssact/ title02/0217.htm#ftn229. 53 Charles I. Schottland, “Social Security Amendments of 1956: A Summary and Legislative History.” Social Security Bulletin 19.9 (1956): 5; Senate Committee on Finance, Providing Benefits for the Survivors of Servicemen and Veterans, and for Other Purposes, 84th Congress, Second Session, Report no. 2380 (Washington, DC, 1956): 1. 54 The military created a separate survivor benefit plan for military service members called the Retired Serviceman’s Family Protection Plan (RSFPP) in 1961. It was funded entirely by service member contributions (as much as $0.23 for each dollar of pay) and would only cover surviving spouses or minor children; parents and former spouses were not eligible. It was replaced by the Survivor Benefit Plan in 1972, which did allow coverage for parents (under the “Persons with an Insurable Interest” category, and benefits could be integrated with the OASI program. James N. Higdon, “The Survivor Benefit Plan: Its History, Idiosyncrasies,

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law, but later removed. The comments on the proposed bill from the General Accounting Office recommended a means test, possibly linked to the parents’ inability to work or to find appropriate work.55 Comments submitted by Veterans Administration staff recommended removing the concept of “dependency,” citing administrative difficulties and a shift from a more uniform benefit system for parents. A summary of the comments recommended deleting the word “dependent” before parent in the sections relevant to parents’ survivor benefits. This would, the letter argued, “make clear the specific income limitations as the criteria and preclude the necessity for regulatory tests of dependency.”56 The final law follows these recommendations and includes no dependency measure as a condition of eligibility.57 As this chapter will show, this was very different from the need to document and measure the level of support provided by a deceased son or daughter in the OASI program. Instead, the military used an income limit. Thus the parent had to demonstrate need via the income means test, but did not have to document the amount of support provided by their deceased child.58 Coverages, Cost and Applications.” Family Law Quarterly. 43.3 (Fall 2009): 440–443; Kristy N. Kamarck and Rabara Salazar Torreon, “Military Survivor Benefit Plan: Background and Issues for Congress,” Congressional Research Service Report. June 29, 2021, 1-2,9-10; David F. Burelli, “The Military Survivor Benefit Plan: A Description of Provisions,” Veterans’ Benefits and Care. Ed. Mathew H. Bradley. (New York: Nova Science Publishers, 2010): 86–87. For a discussion of the military welfare system following the elimination of the draft, see Jennifer Mittlestadt, The Rise of the Military Welfare State (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015). Mittlestadt’s text does not address survivor benefits explicitly. 55 Summary of Comments by General Accounting Office based on a Letter to Senator Harry Byrd dated December 22, 1955, in United States Inter-Service Committee on Military Incentives, Servicemen’s and Veterans’ Survivor Benefits Act of 1956: A Historical Record, 5; Law Library, Library of Congress, James Madison Building. 56 Summary of Comments by the Veterans Administration based on a Letter to Senator Harry Byrd dated December 30, 1955, in United States Inter-Service Committee on Military Incentives, Servicemen’s and Veterans’ Survivor Benefits Act of 1956: A Historical Record, 3–4; quotation on page 4; Law Library, Library of Congress, James Madison Building. 57 Public Law 881, Chapter 837, August 1, 1956, 863–864. 58 In debates over the 1961 RSFPP in 1970, which was revised in 1972 legislation, the major focus was widows. A key point made in those debates was the fact that when a retired service member who was receiving military benefits from the Veterans Administration died, survivors were eligible for only one month of pay. Hearings on the proposed law pointed out that equity was a key issue: “a man who retires for length of service as such in his retired pay that he can leave to his survivors . . . . His survivors have no inherent right to any of his retired pay.” US House of Representatives, Inquiry into Survivor Benefits. Hearings before the Special Subcommittee on Survivor Benefits of the Committee on Armed Services. Ninety-First Congress, Second Session (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1970): 9560.

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definitions of dependency Those deciding the fate of survivor benefits in the OASI program – Advisory Council members, legislators, SSA officials – centered their decisions on the traditional nuclear family, building upon the design in the original OAI program in the 1935 Social Security Act. Those people who were dependent but outside that model, including parents, divorced wives, and husbands, faced greater scrutiny in the granting of benefits. The assumptions underscoring implementation of the program again speak to the role of state institutional actors in promoting and solidifying the nuclear family’s place in policy regardless of the reality of American family structure. The “gendered worldview” underscoring the debates over whom to include in the survivor benefit program extended to the implementation and administration of the program as well, with different measures of dependency required for different potential beneficiaries. Those outside the nuclear family concept faced greater hurdles to eligibility and the initial presumption was that the natural father was the primary source of support. The dependency standards required for parents in OASI placed benefits in a middle ground between means-tested and contributory programs. Although they were eventually included in the 1939 amendments, parents as survivors were in a different category than widows and surviving children. Widows, divorced wives, and children had to be “living with” the deceased wage earner at the time of his death, or benefiting from financial contributions from their husband or ex-husband, to qualify for benefits; widows and children who were living with the deceased wage earner were presumed dependent, and no means test was required.59 In contrast, in the 1939 amendments, parents needed to be “wholly dependent” on the deceased worker at the time of his death, and had to “[file] proof of such dependency and support” – such dependence was not presumed by a shared residence or any amount of financial contributions. The parent faced a means-tested process to qualify for survivor benefits, but once deemed eligible, parents would receive the benefits for their lifetime: “if the total dependency exists at the time of death then the right to a benefit continues without any subsequent reinvestigation of need.”60 “Federal Old-Age and Survivor Insurance,” 9–11; Public Act 379, Social Security Amendments of 1939, 5–6; Senate Report No. 734, Social Security Amendments of 1939, July 2, 1939, 11. 60 US Senate Committee on Finance. Hearings before the Committee on Finance Relative to the Social Security Amendments of 1939, 76th Congress (Washington, DC: US GPO, 59

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Administrators of the program argued that the three groups’ definitions of dependency were “based on a different concept.” They cautioned those investigating applications from attempting to apply definitions from one to another: “the resemblances in the three are superficial for the most part, and an attempted analogy will have distorted and confusing results.”61 A key difference was the presumption of dependence. Unmarried children under the age of eighteen were presumed to be dependent on their natural or adoptive father, and proof of support was not required. Even if the child was not living with the father or receiving support contributions, he or she was still eligible, unless the child was adopted by another individual or was “living with and receiving more than one-half of his support from his stepfather.”62 Members of the OASI general counsel and appeals council pointed to the law’s language to explain the privileging of children’s dependency on a father over other family members, including a mother. Title II reads that “a child shall be deemed dependent upon a father or adopting father . . . unless, at the time of such death . . . such individual was not living with or contributing to the support of such child.”63 OASI officials interpreted the law’s intent to be that “the presumption that a minor child is dependent upon its natural father is far stronger than the presumption that a wife or parent is dependent, respectively, on a husband or a child.” The word “unless” signaled that dependence on the father was presumed and primary, except under specific situations. Officials acknowledged that this presumption would result in more child benefits being approved, but believed that was close to the

1939): 12; US Senate. Committee on Finance. Social Security Amendments of 1939: Senate Finance Committee Report, July 7, 1939 (New York: Commerce Clearing House, 1939): 11; Memo to W. L. Mitchell, Deputy Commission, Federal Security Agency, From Oscar Pogge, dated February 12, 1948, 7; Informal Notes of Commissioner’s Action Meeting, May 23, 1949, 7, SSA Records, Office of the Commissioner, Box 12, Folder May 1946; Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family, 21; Alvin Schorr, “Thy Father & Thy Mother”: A Second Look at Filial Responsibility (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1980): 25. 61 Memo to Area Office, Philadelphia, from Claim Policy Division, ref. March 20, 1945, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464, NA-CP. 62 Summary of 1950 survivor benefits, 9–10; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 22, Folder S1175 – Legislation in General; US Senate Committee on Finance, Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance and Public Assistance Showing Changes Made by the Social Security Amendments of 1956 (US Government Printing Office, 1956): 14. 63 Title II, Public Act No. 379, 76th Congress, Social Security Amendments of 1939, 5–6. My emphasis added.

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reality that most children were dependent on a natural father.64 Again, the traditional nuclear family underscored the law and officials’ implementation of its provisions. OASI benefits were largely administered on a national basis, with the belief that eligibility standards would be uniform across the country governed by federal law. But state law defined the legality of a specific relationship (parent and child, husband and wife) which then determined eligibility. In a 1945 article, OASI Director Oscar Pogge soundly criticized the limitations of eligibility in the SSA governing family benefits, arguing that “In the establishment of family benefits, however, one set of requirements was adopted which results in wholly different treatment for claimants in similar circumstances who live in different parts of the country.”65 Although he did not link these criteria to adherence to the traditional family, they speak directly to the argument that the law’s design and implementation privileged specific family norms. Pogge noted that laws dictating inheritance and marriage are those that create the most variation in the treatment of specific applicants. Not all states recognized the legal status of children born outside of a marriage as defined by state law, and in states with such laws, children of marriages not acknowledged in state law were not eligible for survivor benefits from an insured father. Marriage laws also shaped eligibility. Some couples discovered too late that the marriage they believed to be valid was not, either because the ceremony was performed by someone not authorized to do so, or because one spouse thought an earlier marriage had been legally dissolved but was not. Not all states recognized common-law marriages. In those states, widows (and later widowers) in common-law relationships were not eligible for benefits, and their children also might not be despite being supported their entire lives by the deceased parent.66 Pogge also argues that in denying benefits to those outside a state’s definition of a legal relationship, “we fail to pay insurance benefits for which the worker has been obliged to contribute.”67 His analysis speaks directly to the issue of ensuring equity 64

Memo to Oscar C. Pogge from Joseph McElvain, Chairman, Appeals Council, April 12, 1946, 1–2; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder Dependency – Child – General, NA-CP. 65 Oscar Pogge, “Family Relationships and Old-Age and Survivors Insurance.” Social Security Bulletin. 18.6 (1945): 7. 66 Pogge, “Family Relationships and Old-Age and Survivors Insurance,” 7–8; Michael Fooner, “Some Child Welfare Problems in Social Insurance,” Social Service Review. 16.4 (1942): 651–655. 67 Pogge, “Family Relationships and Old Age and Survivors Insurance,” 8.

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for workers’ contributions, and highlights a group, among others, excluded on the basis of varied state laws. Such laws also limited uniformity in access to benefits across states, despite the federal law. When questions of child dependency moved outside the family model of a male breadwinner in a marriage with a stay-at-home wife, regardless of state law, specific eligibility criteria and exclusions emerged. In cases of divorce, a child could be dependent on a father, mother, or stepparent at different points, but the father was primary and presumed. The support by the stepfather had to be documented to qualify for benefits in his name. Children could only receive benefits via their mother if the natural father was not contributing any support. In explaining the rationale for allotting benefits only if the father was not contributing, Pogge, whose 1945 article did not speak to working mothers, wrote: “While the Bureau recognizes the inequities of this [philosophy] in individual cases, it does have a justification in administrative expediency and in the fact that the presumptions generally fit in . . . with what is actually found to be the facts in human experience.”68 Administration of the program did recognize reasons for interruptions in contributions or support, thus permitting the approval of benefits even if the financial contributions were not occurring at the time of death. For children, this was the “limited interruption” rule – if a father stopped contributing due to illness, service in the military, employment away from the family residence, or even incarceration, the child might still be eligible for benefits. If the intent was for the father to resume contributions once he recovered or returned, the child could still receive survivor benefits. The time of interruption was less critical, according to administrators: “The question of whether the separation is temporary does not turn upon the time or distance separating the parties, but rather upon the nature and character of the absence and the intention of the parties respecting it.”69

68

Memo from Oscar Pogge to Joseph M. McElvain, January 29, 1942, 2–3; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464 Dependency – Child – General, NA-CP. The status of contributions of the father at the time of the mother’s death is key. In one case, the claim was denied: “at the time of the wage earner’s death the father was making regular and substantial contributions to the child’s support, and dependency on the mother is thereby defeated.” Case of Gladys W. Butler, August 8, 1947; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464 Dependency – Child – General, NA-CP. 69 Memo to Area Office, Kansas, from Perrin Lowrey, Division of Claims Policy, July 28, 1949, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464 Dependency – Child – General, NA-CP.

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Earl Craft divorced his son’s mother in 1946, and Craft contributed to his son’s support consistently until November 1948 when he was hospitalized for tuberculosis. Contributions stopped, and Craft died on May 30, 1949. His son’s mother remarried in July 1948, and her husband was supporting the son. Because illness was the reason for the end in contributions, which lasted less than a year, and all evidence indicated that the father would have continued or resumed contributions if he had not fallen ill and died, the child became eligible for survivor benefits.70 In another case, Arthur Ganzel died on November 29, 1948, following failing health due to pneumonia and heart disease complications. After he divorced his son’s mother, he paid $30 each month for the son’s support until ill health limited his ability to provide for his son. His payments for his son stopped in March that year. The payments ceased less than a year before the father’s death, and “there is no evidence in file which would indicate that the wage earner would not have continued to contribute had he been able to do so.”71 Intent to contribute was crucial, and both cases illustrate that absent the illness, the fathers would have continued supporting their children. The time permitted for a “limited interruption” was not defined, and administrators generally applied a one-year limit. Intent, however, continued to be critical. Edwin Heiter died on June 26, 1948. He was contributing regularly to his wife’s support after their separation in January 1947 until June that year, when illness prevented him from providing support and subsequently caused his death. Despite not contributing for more than a year, administrators agreed with investigators that Heiter intended to continue to provide support: “it would not be unreasonable to find that notwithstanding the failure to contribute during the 12-month period immediately preceding death, the claimant may be deemed to have been receiving contributions at the time of death.”72 In contrast, Leon Sais, who was separated from his wife, died in November 1947, but had not contributed to his wife’s support in three years since he fell ill. He began

70

Case of Earl Craft, July 27, 1949, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464 Dependency – Child – General, NA-CP. 71 Case of Arthur Ganzel, June 24, 1949, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464 Dependency – Child – General, NA-CP. 72 Case of Elmer Heiter, March 10, 1949, 1–2; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder S1275, Living with Contributions, June 1943–, NA-CP.

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receiving OASI in October 1946 but made no further contributions to his wife despite the income. His benefits were just $24.12 per month, but any contribution “no matter how small, might have provided evidence that he recognized his obligation to his wife. The fact that he made no further payments indicates clearly the lack of such recognition.”73 Children could gain benefits based on their mother, if the father was not contributing; after the 1950 amendments, a child would also be presumed to be dependent on his or her mother or adoptive mother if she was insured regardless of the father’s contributions.74 Katie Whittington supported her family as her husband often left the family for several months at a time. When she died on December 15, 1944, he had been absent for three weeks. He had made no contributions and was not living with the family. Officials found the child dependent on Whittington and awarded survivor benefits based on her contributions.75 But the presumption of dependence on the natural father would prevail if he was contributing. Gladys Rutter supported her son until three months before her death in 1944. She fell ill and could no longer work, and the court ordered the father to provide support, which he did. Although she had supported her son until her illness, the claim for benefits via the mother was denied. This case demonstrates the different conceptions of dependency in the program (this case occurred before the 1950 amendments revising policies on mothers’ earnings). While a wife or ex-wife was dependent (or not) on a wage earner, the dependency of a child could shift from one wage earner to another – in this case, from Rutter to her son’s father. Although officials found that contributions from the father were irregular and stopped after Rutter’s death, they still denied the application for benefits: “At the time of [Rutter’s] death the father was making regular and substantial contributions to the child’s support, and dependence on the mother is thereby defeated.”76 A stepfather could be supporting a child, but dependency on the natural Case of Leon Sias, December 28, 1949; Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder S1275, Living with Contributions, June 1943–, NA-CP. 74 US Senate, Committee on Finance, Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance, Public Assistance, Maternal and Child Welfare Services. 85th Congress (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1958): 20–21. 75 Case of Katie Whittingon, Emmett South, and Joseph Oswinkle, n.d. 5; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464, Child – Dependency – General, NA-CP. 76 Case of Gladys Rutter, August 8, 1947, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464, Child – Dependency – General, NA-CP. 73

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father would be found if the father was making contributions. Before 1950, in the case of mothers, a father’s limited or irregular contributions would eliminate possible dependence on the mother. The record does not indicate who was supporting or caring for the child after the mother died. Echoing Pogge’s comments earlier regarding the family norms at work, Perrin Lowrey, assistant director of the Bureau of OASI, wrote: “The rules for deeming child dependency are based on Congressional conception of the support situation in the majority of cases and may or may not in individual cases, be based on actual support furnished.”77 Changes in 1961 removed the requirement that children be financially dependent on their mothers to be awarded benefits.78 Like children, a widow’s or ex-wife’s relationship to the deceased wage earner was central in determining eligibility for benefits.79 In cases of separation, desertion, or divorce, women had to prove they were “living with” the deceased wage earner at the time of his death, although this did not necessarily require they be in the same house. “Living with” could mean sharing a household or intending to do so when circumstances permitted (perhaps if a spouse was hospitalized or incarcerated with the expectation to return), or if the wage earner was making “regular contributions” to his wife or former wife.80 Wives in a marriage recognized by the state in which they resided and who lived with their husband at the time of his death were eligible for benefits. No proof of financial dependence was required.81 Those living separately did need to meet certain standards to be eligible. If the couple was separated or divorced, the wife had to prove the husband was either providing support or was ordered to do so by the court. If so, she was deemed to be “living with” him and eligible for benefits, even if they were not living in the same household. As with children under the “limited interruptions” rule, illness could explain decreased or no contributions, and would not preclude the woman from eligibility. Maurice Shaughnessy’s contributions to his exwife were consistent, but unemployment limited his ability to pay support after 1953. He did contribute when he was able and paid some support until his death in 1956. The irregular contributions “whenever he was able indicates that [Shaughnessy] recognized the obligation to support his wife and 77

79 Ibid. 78 Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 167. Ibid. Memo to Harold Packer from Ewell Bartlett stamped April 8, 1959, 1–3; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder Living with – General – July 1954. 81 See earlier discussion of state laws regarding inheritance and marriage. Pogge, “Family Relationships and Old-Age and Survivors Insurance,” 7–8; Fooner, “Some Child Welfare Problems in Social Insurance,” 651–655. 80

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attempted to the best of his ability to fulfill that obligation.”82 Edwin Heiter and his wife separated in January 1947. Heiter paid monthly contributions until June when he became ill and could no longer work. He died a year later, never making another payment. The bureau ruled that he was still “living with” his wife because of the regular contributions before illness prevented him from doing so. Typically a year was the outside window for such a decision, but administrators did award benefits to his wife based on the earlier contributions.83 “Living with” provisions also applied to individuals applying for LumpSum Death Benefits after the 1946 amendments. Lump-Sum Death payments were a single payment to the widow or widower when they were not eligible for survivor benefits; initially the payment was 3.5 percent of the amount a worker paid into the program, but under the 1939 amendments they were equivalent to six months of the monthly benefit that would be paid to a worker fully insured.84 Initially such benefits were paid to a widow based solely on the relationship. After 1946 the payment was paid to the spouse, if he or she was “living with” the individual at the time of death under the same criteria as survivor benefits; the intent was to prevent payment to an “estranged or deserting spouse.”85 Under the 1950 amendments, the death benefit could be paid regardless if a survivor was eligible for monthly benefits. If no spouse was eligible, the payment generally went to the person who paid the burial expenses.86 The 1959 amendments

82

Case of Maurice Shaughnessy, June 12, 1957, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder Definition of Living With. 83 Case of Edwin Heiter, March 10, 1949, 1–2; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder S1275, Living with Contributions, June 1943–, NA-CP. Institutionalization could also explain a lack of contributions, and would not preclude a wife from receiving benefits. A key measure was if the couple was living together when the husband was institutionalized (either in a hospital or prison) and if the relationship would continue after release. See Case of Clarence Allen, August 16, 1944, 1; Case of Roscoe Bennett, October 14, 1954, 1–2; Case of Fred Knorr and Julia Knorr; Case of Riley Jones, August 7, 1956, 1–2; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder Living With, NA-CP. 84 “Agency History Research Note #2: The History and Development of the Lump Sum Death Benefit,” Social Security. July 28, 2020, www.ssa.gov/history/lumpsum.html. 85 Memo from Ewell T. Bartlett to Harold Parker, stamped April 8, 1959, 1–2; Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 26, Folder S1275, Living With Contributions, June 1943–, NA-CP. 86 The LSDP was not solely for burial expenses, but it became identified with that over the years. The 1950 amendments changed the LSDP to the equivalent of three months of the insurance amount due a fully insured eligible worker, reflecting the significant increase in

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changed the language to “living in the same household,” leaving administrators to determine how to apply that measure. They opted not to make it more restrictive – questions arose most often in cases involving institutionalization in a hospital – as “it was not required by the law, nor can we work such a concept into a logical and satisfactory operating rule.”87 They did rule that burial costs were unlikely to be shouldered by a spouse or exspouse not living in the same household, and thus held that requirement in those cases.88

dependent parents Parents faced a different measure of dependency for eligibility from widows, ex-wives, and children. The assumption was that children were dependent, as were widows who were “living with” the deceased worker, and thus the central question was: On whom were they dependent? In the OASI program, parents were not presumed to be dependent, and thus had to prove that an adult child was providing a specific amount of support because the parent’s financial resources were inadequate. If the parent had sufficient resources or could not document that a son or daughter was providing a specific level of support, he or she would not be eligible for benefits. As noted, under the 1939 amendments, parents had to demonstrate they were “wholly dependent” on the son or daughter, which required that they demonstrate that an adult child was covering 75 percent of their needs. As Nancy Houghton’s case, discussed in the chapter’s introduction, demonstrates, insufficient documentation could prevent a parent from being awarded benefits: “Conjecture as to what the wage earner may have provided had he not died cannot be used as a basis for what he did provide.”89 The report cited in The Creation of Survivor Benefits evaluating survivor benefits criticized the variation in dependency requirements between benefits for surviving widows and children on the one hand, and parents

monthly benefits to OASDI recipients. The average payment in 1940 was $145.79 and increased slightly to $147.81 in 1950 (about $3,122 and $1,872 in 2022 dollars, respectively). “Agency History Research Note #2; Summary of 1950 Amendments,” 13; US House of Representatives. Ways and Means Committee, Social Security after 18 Years: A Staff Report for the Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1954): 19. 87 88 Memo from Ewell to Packer, stamped April 8, 1959, 2. Ibid. 89 Memo to Area Office, Kansas City, from Perrin Lowrey, Division of Claims Policy, July 30, 1951, 2.

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on the other. The report pointed to the “theoretical inconsistency” of requiring parents to prove dependence in a contributory program, which contradicted “the basic theory of a social security system which selects classes that as groups face certain risks, and which pays benefits, when and if these risks materialize, on the basis of a presumption that all need compensation for the loss involved.”90 The requirement of proving dependency inevitably placed parents in a separate class of other beneficiaries under OASI. While separated and divorced wives not living together in the same household as their husband or ex-husband had to demonstrate the receipt of, or court order to make, financial contributions, they did not have to provide documentation of a specific measure of support. And as noted, children were presumed to be dependent, although investigators may need to determine on whom they were dependent. Dependent husbands – who relied on wives for support – became eligible for survivor benefits under the 1950 amendments. Husbands who were not breadwinners fell outside the family norms driving these benefits, and – like parents – had to prove dependence to be eligible. Simply “living with” as in the case of widows or ex-wives was not enough. Husbands had to be living with their wife, and also receiving – and able to document – half support from her to be eligible for benefits.91 The husband’s insurance benefits, earned through his employment, had to be less than the amount he would receive as a dependent husband.92 As with parents, there was no presumption of dependence.93 Support evaluations by the Bureau of OASI considered the year’s support prior to the worker’s death in determining the level of support. Parents applying for benefits had to submit their initial application, although it did not have to include support documentation, within two years of their wage-earning son or daughter’s death.94 The law stated that “Report 20: Parent’s Benefits,” 2. Summary of 1950 Amendments, 8–9, 12; Social Security after 18 Years, 19, 28–29; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 161, 167. 92 US Senate Committee on Finance. Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance, 19–20. 93 The differential application of standards based on gendered notions of family and work were not overturned until 1975 when the Supreme Court ruled against the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. The court’s decision stated that such practices “unfairly discriminated against women because their contributions to Social Security did not buy as much as the contributions of men.” In short, the system paid little attention to the arguments about equity for men in the case of women. Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 167–169. 94 Letter to Birmingham Office from Perrin Lowrey dated November 24, 1947, 1, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, NA-CP. 90 91

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the parent had to be dependent “at the time of such individual’s death,” but the SSA considered the twelve months preceding the wage earner’s death to gain “a clearer picture of the parent’s current dependency status.”95 The wage earner had to be contributing to the parent at least three of those twelve months.96 This policy allowed for consideration of unexpected circumstances, such as the illness of either the parents or the wage earner, or a poor crop if the wage earner was a farmer. If the son or daughter ceased support for more than a year, the parents likely would find alternate support, according to the policy, and thus were no longer dependent on the son or daughter. The goal was to ensure “that the maximum number of persons could be found dependent without straining the meaning of the law,” and not to unnecessarily eliminate beneficiaries “who at some more remote time preceding the wage-earner’s death may have been self-supporting.”97 To demonstrate dependency, a parent submitted statements to that effect, as well as statements from other people (likely family members), attesting to the support provided by the deceased worker. Financial documentation, including canceled checks, that showed the support, were also submitted.98 Collecting and assessing the information proved challenging for both agency officials and for the parents. Few applicants kept detailed financial records, as they did not know they would have to document contributions, and some parents had difficulty remembering details regarding support.99 Balancing the program’s goal of extending benefits to dependent parents with the establishment of that dependency was an ongoing tension. Family members were often key sources of information in application investigations, including other adult children or the children of the deceased wage earner. Family members did not always agree on who was dependent, and contradictory claims could occur. Relatives of deceased workers who left no dependents eligible for survivor benefits received the Lump Sum Death Benefit. In applying for this benefit, relatives were asked if there was 95

Letter to Kansas City Area Office, Claims Policy Division, from Perrin Lowrey dated April 7, 1948, 1–2, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, NA. 96 97 “Report 20: Parent’s Benefits,” 4. Ibid., 1. 98 “Summary of Presently Available Data on Dependency, in Relation to Parents’ Claims for Old Age and Survivor’s Benefits.” Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940– 1951; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, NA-CP. The document has no date, but given its placement and content, it was likely from 1941. 99 Ibid., 6.

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a survivor eligible for benefits (widow, child, or parent).100 If the response was no, then the death benefit was paid. In some cases, this resulted in competing claims for the worker’s benefits. In 1949, John Hutchinson died, and his daughter applied for the Lump Sum Death Benefit, noting on her application that no parent dependent on her father survived. A year later Hutchinson’s mother, the daughter’s grandmother, applied for survivor benefits as a dependent parent, including a statement from her daughter supporting her claim. Hutchinson’s daughter refuted that, arguing that her grandmother was self-supporting.101 The disagreement among family members complicated the application. Typically the daughter’s corroboration of the support would be enough to prove dependency, but because a death benefit was already paid, the challenge to the original claim needed to present “thoroughly satisfactory” evidence. Officials saw a conflict of interest in the disagreement, as the daughter, who was currently providing support for the mother, would benefit from her mother’s eligibility for survivor benefits as those benefits would reduce the need for the daughter to provide support. The outcome is not clear, but officials recommended contacting another daughter, the son’s landlord, or members of their church for corroborating evidence.102 Officials did change the form to ask if there was a parent surviving, regardless of dependency, to prevent the payment of lump-sum benefits when a parent might apply for survivor benefits.103 But investigators still relied on information from family, who could disagree on who was dependent or not. The 1950 amendments made it possible for both a parent and a surviving child to receive survivor benefits, thus making more parents potentially eligible for benefits. Evelyn Slack died May 22, 1950, with her husband, daughter, who was under eighteen, and her mother surviving. Her daughter was supported by her husband, and was not the primary claimant on her benefits, and thus the parent was eligible. The daughter became eligible for benefits under the 1950 amendments which extended benefits to children not fully dependent on the deceased parent. Requirements for children dependent on insured married mothers were liberalized in particular. The amendments also protected those already granted benefits – in this case the mother – from losing them. Thus both “Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance,” 12. Memo to Area Office, Philadelphia, from Perrin Lowery, Assistant Director, September 26, 1949, 1. 102 Ibid. 103 Memo to Howard C. Dunne, Regional Representative, from Perrin Lowery, Assistant Director, August 12, 1949, 1. 100 101

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the daughter and mother received survivor benefits.104 This was also the case with military benefits after 1933; both a parent and surviving spouse and/or child could be eligible for benefits at the same time.105 Illness could complicate the application for benefits if it prevented a worker from supporting a parent for a period of time prior to his or her death. If an adult son or daughter died before the parent, a serious illness was often the cause, disrupting the support. Termed the “untoward circumstances” rule – similar in some ways to the limited interruption standard used in child dependency cases – this gave administrators some flexibility in determining support at the time of the worker’s death.106 The policy was developed because so many parents were not receiving support when the son or daughter died, but the adult child “had contributed substantially during the year preceding his death.” If strictly applied, many parents would not receive benefits.107 In one case, Norman Dyker had supported his mother until June 1945, when he fell ill. He died January 23, 1946. His mother used savings to support herself during that period, although at reduced circumstances. The investigator computed the support received before and after the illness and found that the mother’s income declined by 25 percent without the son’s support. Since he had supported her for at least three of the previous twelve months, and her income was not sufficient “to maintain herself in customary circumstances,” officials found her to be wholly dependent on her son and approved benefits.108 The three-month rule, although perceived to be liberal by officials, could result in a denial of benefits if the illness was prolonged. Charles Horton suffered a stroke in June of 1947, and he was no longer able to work and support his mother. Both received general assistance from their township until his death on June 12, 1948. Officials did not rule in favor of benefits for the mother, arguing that there was no evidence of support in that year preceding his death. They suggested that if Mr. Horton had 104

Memo to Area Office, Philadelphia, from Perrin Lowery, Assistant Director, May 31, 1951, 1; Wilbur J. Cohen and Robert J. Myers, “Social Security Amendments of 1950: A Summary and Legislative History.” Social Security Bulletin 13.10 (1950): 3, 5, 10–11. 105 Aaronson, “Pensions and Compensation to Veterans and Their Dependents,” 16. 106 Memo from Ewell T. Bartlett, Assistant Director, Bureau of OASI, June 26, 1958, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1952–; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, NA-CP. 107 Case of Charles Kisen, March 22, 1944, 1–2; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder 464, NA-CP. 108 Memo to Area Office, Chicago, from Perrin Lowrey, Assistant Director, April 23, 1948, 1–2.

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a bank account or a car to sell those assets could constitute support for his mother, but no such evidence existed. The OASI attorney dealing with the case noted that this was “one of the hardship cases which indicates that it is difficult to draw a line in the administration of a law.” The attorney also argued that the definition of “at the time of his death” was already liberally interpreted, and that “the further extension of the time requirement would not seem to be a reasonable or desirable interpretation.”109 Thus Horton’s mother received no survivor benefits and likely remained an OAA recipient for the remainder of her life. Receipt of OAA to compensate a parent for the loss of a child’s support would not necessarily preclude the awarding of benefits. Charles King supported his mother at the required level until four months before his death. When he fell ill and was no longer able to contribute, case workers increased his mother’s OAA grant due to the loss of his support. Local investigators sought the advice of Assistant Director Perrin Lowrey, who found that with the twelve-month rule, a finding of dependency was justified and not “unreasonable.”110 OAA grants were not considered income if a son or daughter’s contributions to their parents’ support was part of the investigation into resources of the parents when they applied for aid. If it was not reported at that time, the grant would be considered income.111 Relaxing the one-year rule was debated but ultimately rejected. The complexities of administering parents’ benefits were an ongoing struggle, and administrators believed that extending the time period only added complications. Intent of the wage earner was a determination, particularly if unexpected circumstances made support difficult, but intent was irrelevant, according to administrators, if it was “incapable of ever being carried out.” If an illness was so extensive – and perhaps terminal – as to prevent support beyond one year and to prompt parents to look elsewhere for support, then the support by the son or daughter was no longer present.112 Such was the basis for the US Appeals Court’s decision in Baetich v. Hobby in 1954. A father sought benefits after his daughter died of cancer, arguing 109

Memo to Albert A. Kyle, OASI Representation, from Claire I. Rosen, June 25, 1948, 1–2. Memo to Area Office, Kansas City, from Perrin Lowrey, Assistant Director, January 3, 1950, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940– 1951, NA-CP. 111 Memo to Sherwood Avery, Regional Director, Dallas, October 18, 1950, 1; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management and Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, RG 47, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951, NA-CP. 112 Memo to Robert M. Ball, Deputy Director, to Harold Packer, Assistant General Counsel, March 1, 1954, 2. 110

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that she had supported him until her illness, but was denied benefits as support had ended twenty-seven months before the daughter’s death. The district court ruled in favor of the father, but the Appeals Court reversed. After the daughter was unable to support her father, a son provided the majority of his support, “creating an economic relationship between plaintiff and his son which had superseded his dependency on his daughter.” The court ruled that the father was dependent on the son, but not the daughter, at the time of her death.113 Efforts to expand the period considered beyond the year rendered consistency in decisions difficult if not impossible, according to the opinion, prompting the Appeals Court to discard it. Such a practice also would, according to some officials, “create entitlement that would vitiate the support concept in the Act.”114 The support test persisted, distinguishing survivor benefits from other benefits under OASI.

the persistence of the means test Despite relaxing the definitions of dependence required for eligibility, the program continued to require a means test to determine initial eligibility. Subsequent revisions of the survivor benefits for parents shifted from “wholly dependent” to “chiefly dependent” in 1946.115 As interpreted by administrators, “chiefly dependent” meant that an individual provided more than 50 percent of a parent’s support. The goal of the change, according to House and Senate committee reports, was to simplify the application process for parents and to ensure benefits “in the fairly typical situation in which one child has assumed the major support of his parents but other children have contributed some minor part toward it, and the parents suffer a serious financial loss upon the death of the child who was their chief support.”116 Property limits of $1,000 also eliminated some parents from eligibility for survivor benefits. In a 1948 analysis of the amendment’s recommendations, Oscar Pogge pointed to the discrepancy from other survivor benefits in the means test: “our publications with respect to OASI benefits have always emphasized that such benefits are not based on need, but are an 113

Baetich v. Hobby, 212 F.2 480, US Appeals Court. 114 Ibid., 2. Angela J. Murray, “Social Security Act Amendments of 1946,” Social Security Bulletin. 9.9 (1946): 7. 116 Reports quoted in letter to Arthur Altmeyer from Jane Hoey, Director, BPA, dated April 14, 1949, 1, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951; Records of the Bureau of OASI, Division of Management Resources – Policy and Precedent Subject Files, NA-CP. 115

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earned increment flowing from coverage under the program.” While other beneficiaries are presumed to be dependent, regardless of financial circumstance, parents were not. “The effect of the property limitation is to apply a test of need which seems foreign to the basic philosophy of payments under OASI and more nearly approaches old age assistance.”117 Parents’ survivor benefits represented a middle ground between the earned benefits of OASI and the means-tested assistance granted through OAA; the initial means test eliminated some parents from receiving survivor benefits. Jane Hoey, director of the Bureau of Public Assistance, also criticized parts of the means test in OASI for parents. She advocated for parents’ eligibility for survivor benefits based on a less stringent definition of dependency, and expressed concern for those deemed ineligible for benefits.118 One of her critiques centered on attempts to define property limits for “chiefly dependent upon,” particularly when such property produced no income and thus did not provide for an aged parent’s daily support. In doing so, the social insurance program was implementing methods used in public assistance programs, she argued: “The disadvantages of introducing a fictitious type of means test into old-age and survivor insurance and of administratively evaluating the forced sale value of property, are obvious and need not be discussed here.” She also cautioned that states might adopt such practices, long discouraged by federal policy: “As you know, we have always recommended that States avoid the fiction of attributing to a recipient income that is not available for its use. It would be unfortunate if a policy of the Social Security Administration should now result in what we have been asking States to avoid.”119 Hoey pointed to the inconsistent application of the means test, and implicitly to the in-between status of OASI and parents in terms of an “earned” benefit or a means-tested one. Her critique echoed that of the 1941 report that spoke to the inconsistency in requiring a benefit group to prove need in a social insurance system based on contributions.120

117

Memo to W. L. Mitchell, Deputy Commission, Federal Security Agency, from Pogge, dated February 12, 1948, 7. 118 Hoey suggested more than once in the May 23, 1949, meeting of the Social Security Board that the board undertake studies “to see what happens” to parents who are deemed ineligible. Informal Notes of Commissioner’s Action Meeting, May 23, 1949, 3, 8, SSA Records, Office of the Commissioner, Box 12, Folder May 1946. 119 Memo from Jane Hoey to Arthur J. Altmeyer, Commissions, SSA, April 14, 1949, 2, SSA Records, RG 47, Office of Commissioner, Commissioners’ Decisions, Box 26, Binder January 1949 to August 1949, NA-CP. 120 “Report 20: Parent’s Benefits,” 2.

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Despite amendments to the program, the means test provision remained intact, and limited the number of recipients in the program. In 1950 the law required that an adult child be providing one-half support. Later changes also enabled parents to receive benefits even with other survivors, as noted earlier. While the means test was limited to the initial application for benefits, it was a difficult hurdle for many applicants and eliminated some applicants from eligibility. In the first version of the dependency requirement, about 40 percent of applicants were denied; with the first revision, that number dropped to about 25 percent.121 In 1957, 40 percent of applications were denied, and that number rose to 45 percent in 1977; most denials were because a parent did not prove the required level of dependency.122 Survivor benefits for parents were intended as a transition program; until more employees were covered under the OASI by their own employment, parents’ benefits provided another means to support needy aged, while preserving equity for workers who contributed to the program but who died before collecting benefits. A key reason for the small numbers, policy analyst Alvin Schorr argues, was the difficulty in proving dependency. Requiring proof indicates that this type of dependency was not typical or presumed. Aging parents may not have records that demonstrate the support a son or daughter provided, and with that child now deceased, obtaining documentation was even more difficult. If more than one child provided support for a parent, the parent would not meet the one-half support criteria. If they were receiving other benefits, including another government program (such as OAA or the later Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program), that income would reduce the percentage of support provided by an adult child. The situation was even more difficult if the parent lived with the adult child. In these cases, the deceased child would have had to provide three-quarters of the expenses: his or her own half and one-half of the parents’ needs. The parent also had to demonstrate financial need: “The burden of establishing one-half support is on the parent in a situation when separate accounts may not have been kept.”123 The program focused on cash contributions, when many children supported their parents in other ways, including housekeeping, transportation, caregiving, or

121

Informal Notes of Commissioner’s Action Meeting, May 23, 1949, 7, SSA Records, Office of the Commissioner, Box 12, Folder May 1946. 122 Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family, 21; Schorr, Thy Father & Thy Mother, 25. 123 Schorr, Thy Father & Thy Mother, 25–26; Schorr, Filial Responsibility, 21–22.

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in-kind contributions, but program requirements did not account for such contributions in its calculation of support. Pogge argued that the “arithmetic approach is not invariably practical or just.” Often the parent’s dependency was “so obvious that arithmetic is not necessary, if not irrelevant. If we impose upon our claims people a hard-and-fast arithmetic rule, arbitrary and capricious results would be unavoidable.”124 Schorr argues that the program did not mesh with the reality of how adult children contributed to their parents’ support. According to Schorr, most adult children did not provide direct cash contributions, in part due to their own limited resources: “Living together is more often the way in which adult children assist their parents. But ‘one-half support’ does not test either in the ways in which they are typically practiced.”125 If parents were denied survivor benefits, most likely they turned to OAA, or to SSI after 1974. Schorr argues that parents who lived with an adult child who died should be considered dependent; the living situation alone, he argues, established dependency. Many elderly would turn to other benefit programs if denied survivor benefits, and thus the government would be paying for their support in some way: “The government would experience little difference in cost but the aged person would find entitlement tests and reporting less onerous.”126 In the scope of the larger OASI system, the number of parents receiving survivor benefits seems relatively inconsequential, but the program’s administration reveals presumptions of dependency different from those for widows and children. The state’s regulation of parent benefits based on the nuclear family reinforced beliefs that parent dependency was unusual and required proof. Not only was the state enforcing dependency but it was also creating the definition of that dependency. In 1949, about 12,500 parents qualified for survivor benefits, a fraction of the 623,900 families receiving other dependent benefits.127 Parents receiving survivor benefits increased to about 36,000 by 1960, and then declined again to 17,000 in 1978.128 For parents able to qualify, the benefits were critical parts of their support, and may have enabled them to remove themselves from the OAA program and its repeated investigations.

124

Letter to Robert C. Ayers, Assistant General Counsel, from Pogge dated November 19, 1948, 2, Box 10, Folder S475, Dependency of Parent, 1940–1951. 125 126 Schorr, Filial Responsibility, 22. Schorr, Thy Father & Thy Mother, 27. 127 “Family Benefits under Old-Age and Survivor Insurance, 1949.” Social Security Bulletin. 12.8 (1949): 19. 128 Schorr, Thy Father & Thy Mother, 25.

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Parents of color did receive benefits via the survivor benefits program: about 10 percent of beneficiaries in 1960 were black parents. That number increased to 12 percent in 1967 (although the total number of parents receiving benefits declined). In 1973, all parents of color receiving benefits totaled 17 percent, while black parents comprised 13 percent of the total. The number of parents of color receiving benefits during those years peaked at 3,700 in 1967.129 As with parents overall, the survivor benefit program served a small number of aged parents of color. All the challenges of qualifying for benefits identified by Schorr would also extend to parents of color. The amount of monthly benefits also was reduced for recipients of color due to smaller earnings from a strictly segregated labor market. Parents of color receiving survivor benefits saw similar decreased benefits: $53.10 for black recipients compared to $60 for white parents in 1960; $78.40 for white parents and $59.80 for black parents in 1967. In 1973, when the categories for recipients were differentiated between all parents of color and black parents, benefits were $143.50 for white parents, $123.50 for all parents of color, and $125.30 for black parents.130 Lower benefits for OASI recipients also meant that more people relied on both OASI and OAA: in 1962, 26 percent of aged married couples of color relied on both OASDI and OAA, but just 6 percent of aged white married couples received both OASDI and OAA. Rates are even higher for nonmarried men and women: 19 percent of all nonmarried men of color and 35 percent of all nonmarried women of color received both OAA and OASDI compared to 9 percent of nonmarried white men and 7 percent of nonmarried white women.131 The limited conceptualization of family by the Advisory Council – and its persistence in policy – excluded parents as beneficiaries. While acknowledging the dependency of the elderly, and the role that children played in alleviating their parents’ financial need, they did not see those relationships fitting their discussions of survivors. When the members of the Ways and Means Committee did recommend their inclusion, arguments were framed around equity, or fairness for the likely male worker who died before he was able to collect benefits in his own right, or to marry and have children who could receive them on his behalf. While other policies mandated support of parents, survivor benefits did not assume such support; the

Thompson, “Blacks and Social Security Benefits,” 32. Ibid., 35. The benefits in 2022 dollars are, respectively, $540 and $610 in 1960; $710 and $542 in 1967; and $1,004, $864, and $877 in 1973. 131 Orshansky, “The Aged Negro and His Income,” 6. 129 130

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means test requirement, and the difficulties of proving dependence, limited the number of parents receiving survivor benefits. Thus parents, although one could argue that they had “earned” such benefits by raising a productive worker citizen who contributed to the social insurance program, were not presumed dependent and were required to document support, including, ironically, from other surviving adult children. The death of one child who was providing support reduced the possibility of parents being supported by their children, a point not articulated by the council. Thus parent dependency policies were almost contradictory, presuming and enforcing dependence in public assistance programs, but requiring proof of dependency in the contributory programs. In some ways, parents could not win.

4 Taxing Rewards Parent Dependency and American Tax Policy

Doris Harrison, a Florida schoolteacher, was supporting both her parents in 1966, including her father whose health confined him to a wheelchair. She spent about one-quarter of her teacher’s salary ($6,000 in 1966) on medical care, primarily for her parents.1 She lived in their home, paid the property taxes and utility bills, and purchased her parents’ food and clothing. Her father had a $700 monthly income from social security, but her mother did not; Harrison claimed her mother as a dependent on her 1958 taxes as her income was below the $600 limit required for the tax exemption. Two years later the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) questioned the dependency status of her mother and began an audit of Harrison’s taxes.2 The letter was highlighted in the opening statement of a 1966 hearing by the US Senate’s Special Committee on Aging to investigate the number of taxpayers providing significant support for aging parents, and to assess if the US tax system could do more to reward those who did assume that obligation: Was the system fair to people who did support parents? The committee’s findings confirmed the willingness of many people to provide 1 2

That income translates to $55,901 in 2022 dollars. $600 translates to $5,590 and $700 to $6,522 in 2022 dollars. Anonymous letter to Senator Smathers, “Appendix A,” Tax Consequences of Contributions to Needy Older Relatives: Hearing before the Special Committee on Aging, United States Senate. 89th Congress, 2nd Session. June 15, 1966 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office): 33. The majority of the original letters are found in the Special Committee on Aging’s records at the National Archives in Washington, DC. If the letter author requested anonymity in the hearing record, I do not cite the proper name in this text and instead use a fictitious name. See Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, National Archives, Washington, DC (hereafter cited as NADC).

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significant financial support for aging parents: “there are throughout the Nation many younger adults who quietly and without fanfare make significant financial contributions, sometimes at considerable personal sacrifice, to meet the economic needs of older family members.”3 The hearing’s assessment of tax policy concluded “that Federal tax laws discriminate against and penalize many, if not most taxpayers who sacrifice to provide financial assistance to needy older relatives.”4 The final policy arena that speaks to parent dependency is the American federal tax system. The 1966 hearing is a revealing moment in the debates over how best to provide support for aging parents, highlighting the financial and emotional burdens faced by taxpayers who supported parents. The hearings resulted in no major policy changes, and thus in some sense were a failure, but they provide insight into how notions of family operated in federal tax policy. The debates over these policies centered on how best to provide for dependent parents, and the effectiveness of the tax system in encouraging specific behaviors that foster family support of the aged. In these debates, committee members embraced a conceptualization of family that rested on expected obligations of support and care in the extended family, rather than government support via direct spending programs. In 1966 the Special Committee on Aging, comprised of twelve Democrats and eight Republican senators representing seventeen different states, recommended more generous tax benefits for those who supported aging parents, in contrast to Department of Treasury officials who sought to reduce such benefits in the name of tax reform of the tax expenditure system. While the committee’s final report included a minority statement by seven of the eight Republican committee members, all agreed on the central theme of the report’s recommendations: the federal tax system should provide more support for families supporting older members. The hearings – and the letters generated from publicity of the committee’s work – provide important voices in this analysis. Parents and the children who supported them wrote to Senator George Smathers, the committee’s chairperson and a Democrat from Florida, detailing the financial and emotional challenges they faced in caring for their parents. The letters describe sacrifices made for parents, from providing significant financial support to foregoing their own plans to marry to care for parents, and the difficulty if not impossibility of qualifying for what 3 4

Tax Consequences, Hearing, Special Committee on Aging, 1. Tax Consequences of Contributions to Needy Older Relatives: A Report by the Special Committee on Aging, United States Senate. 89th Congress, 2nd Session, October 7, 1966, 1.

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many saw as inadequate tax benefits. They sought increased tax benefits and a more humane system of filing. They battled a system that saw such assistance as outside the norm of the traditional nuclear family that pervaded, and continues to pervade, American social policy. Dependency of elderly parents on adult children was not a given but a trend that needed documentation and proof, even in the tax code, and the benefits provided for those able to do so were limited and meager. What is also telling, however, is that none sought to abdicate their responsibility to their parents, nor did they call for more government support via Old Age Assistance (OAA). Many supported their parents to prevent them from relying on public assistance. Most simply asked for some financial help via the tax system to reduce the financial burden of supporting their parents. The parents and families participating in these conversations positioned themselves as taxpayers who merited more benefits via the tax system. Rather than seeking to save taxpayers’ money, as advocates of responsible relative laws did, these individuals sought to gain access to benefits that recognized either their contributions to their parents’ needs or their children’s contributions to their support. Scholars have demonstrated how the tax system incentivizes certain actions, such as purchasing a home, with tax benefits, usually in the form of a deduction or credit.5 Christopher Howard and Suzanne Mettler are among scholars who argue that these benefits are “hidden” or “submerged” in American social policy as they operate through the tax code and need approval only through the tax committees in the US Senate and House.6 The benefits addressed in the hearing were largely those assisting adult children who could claim parents as dependents on their tax returns; the dependency expenditure did not financially benefit parents directly. The tax system provided direct benefits to elderly Americans through their taxes, but dependency credits sought to reimburse, partially, individuals 5

Christopher Howard, The Hidden Welfare State: Tax Expenditures and Social Policy in the United States (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997); see also Suzanne Mettler, The Submerged State: How Invisible Government Policies Undermine American Democracy (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011); Molly C. Michelmore, Tax and Spend: The Welfare State, Tax Politics, and the Limits of American Liberalism (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012); and Julian E. Zelizer, Taxing America: Wilbur D. Mills, Congress and the State, 1945–1975 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998). For a contrasting view, see Monica Prasad, “Tax ‘Expenditures’ and Welfare States: A Critique.” Journal of Policy History. 23.2 (2011): 251–266. 6 Mettler, The Submerged State, 16–17; Howard, The Hidden Welfare State, 10; Stanley S. Surrey, “Tax Incentives as a Device for Implementing Government Policy: A Comparison with Direct Government Expenditures,” Harvard Law Review. 83.4 (1970): 728–729.

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who provided support to parents. Hearing committee members argued that more generous benefits for taxpayers who supported aging parents would foster more family aid. In the case of the tax code, “the government is able to provide for the welfare of its citizens through incentives and inducements that rely on family relations. Family status not only confers the benefits of public assistance to particular individuals – and restricts it from others – but also requires family members to act in particular ways for the benefit of others.”7 Using Rachel Moran’s assessment, tax benefits were an “understated nudge” toward family support.8 In the case of dependent parents, tax policy rewarded those who fulfilled support obligations for parents, but the committee members believed such policies should be more generous. The tax hearing occurred in the context of larger – and ongoing – debates about how best to address poverty among the aged, including raising benefit levels in the Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance program (OASDI) as well as expanding the workers it covered.9 Among the elderly, gender, age, income, and marital status were key factors in the receipt of larger financial contributions from children. Adult children (and other family members) contributed to their parents’ support, particularly for parents over the age of seventy-three and nonmarried women, a category largely comprised of widows. A 1963 survey conducted by the Social Security Administration (SSA) found that contributions from people outside the parents’ household accounted for a low of 1 percent of income for those in the higher-income brackets, but as high as 6 percent for widows in the lower-third income bracket.10 A 1967 study found that overall 3 percent of aged Americans’ income was derived from family contributions, likely their children. That number increased to 5 percent for widows and 4 percent for both widows and widowers: the nonmarried elderly parent secured the most support. When the category of age is added (including those over seventy-three), 7 percent of nonmarried women’s income was from family Patricia Strach and Kathleen S. Sullivan, “The State’s Relations: What the Institution of Family Tells Us about Governance,” Political Research Quarterly. 64.1 (2011): 98. 8 Rachel Louise Moran, Governing Bodies: American Politics and the Shaping of the Modern Physique (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018): 2. 9 Stanley Surrey addresses the contrast between direct expenditures and tax incentives as policy solutions in his article, “Tax Incentives as a Device for Implementing Government Policy: A Comparison with Direct Government Expenditures,” Harvard Law Review. 83.4 (1970): 727–734. 10 Contributions accounted for 5 percent of married couples’ income in the lower-third income bracket. Erdman Palmore, “Differences in Sources and Size of Income: Findings of the 1963 Survey of the Aged.” Social Security Bulletin. 28.5 (1965): 4. 7

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contributions for both those receiving OASDI and those who do not.11 A 1960 study echoed those findings, arguing that between 5 and 10 percent of aging Americans received support from adult children.12 The 1968 survey conducted by the SSA classified 44 percent of respondents in the poor category and 11 percent as near poor, indicating the level of need among the elderly, even with OASDI benefits.13 Staff of the senate committee estimated that these percentages translated into 586,040 people receiving contributions from people outside their home, with 272,820 in the lower-third income bracket. Those numbers, they emphasized, did not include support provided to parents living with their children, such as Harrison described in the chapter’s introduction.14 The committee’s central question was to investigate how the federal tax system could be marshaled to address poverty among the aged by rewarding children who did support their parents, and to encourage more to do so. As demonstrated throughout this text, defining and determining dependency were central to all parent dependency policies, and tax policies were no different. As addressed in the first two chapters of this book, the Social Security Act left the issue of filial responsibility in public assistance programs (OAA, Aid to the Blind, and Aid to Dependent Children) to states; recall that in 1967, about two-thirds of states had laws specifically addressing the responsibility of children to support parents, either through the OAA program or general welfare laws.15 State laws enforced filial responsibility in public assistance programs with investigations of adult children’s resources in evaluating the need of the applicant for OAA. If the adult child was determined to be able to contribute to support, the parent would either be deemed ineligible for assistance, or the amount of assistance would be reduced. In states with such laws, the adult child’s support was a presumed legal obligation to be enforced, in part to limit public assistance costs.16

Lenore E. Bixby, “Income of People Aged 65 and Older: Overview from 1968 Survey of the Aged.” Social Security Bulletin. 33.4 (1970): 13, 15. 12 Alvin L. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family (Washington, DC: US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, 1960): 32. 13 Bixby, “Income of People Aged 65 and Older,” 8. A 1960 study estimated that about onethird of elderly Americans lived with their children. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family, 8. 14 Tax Consequences, Hearing, 2, 66. 15 Elizabeth Epler, “Old-Age Assistance: Plan Provisions on Children’s Responsibility for Parents,” Social Security Bulletin. 17.4 (1954): 5. 16 Enforcement of these laws was waning by the 1960s, and Medicaid provisions explicitly excluded relatives from consideration in eligibility for the medical assistance program. Exceptions included spouses of applicants, or if an applicant is a child under twenty-one or 11

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In contrast, parents were not presumed dependent in either survivor benefits or federal tax policies. If a parent’s adult child died leaving no wife or minor children, a parent might be eligible for survivor benefits, based on the worker’s earnings, as detailed in the previous chapter. Before receiving such benefits, the parent had to prove a level of dependency, an often difficult task, but once dependency was established, parents received lifetime benefits based upon their son’s or daughter’s contributions. The need to prove dependency existed in tax policy as well; adult children had to document their support of their parents with receipts and could receive no tax benefit if their parents’ income was above $600, as Doris Harrison’s experience shows. Patricia Strach’s argument regarding core assumptions in tax policy relates to dependency and shared resources. She argues that the type of kin relationship determines how much “proof” is required to demonstrate dependency: “the more distant the kin relationship the greater need to show shared resources.”17 Thus a mother or father would not have to document their financial support of children, but a taxpayer supporting a parent would. Such documentation could prove difficult for taxpayers seeking the dependency credit for a parent. The IRS had never questioned Harrison’s claim on earlier tax returns, and she did not save the required receipts: “From April until July of 1961, I was in a mental turmoil as a result of the harassing letters from the IRS . . . I had to take time to go over all my statements and answer their innumerable requests for verification, and fight the mounting feelings of frustration at their ‘disallowed’ amounts.”18 Marguerite Haas wrote the second of two letters to Smathers five months after the hearings while waiting for an appointment with an IRS agent: “I just can’t be missing all that work and besides they make a nervous wreck of me.”19 An IRS audit, in some ways, mirrored the investigations of responsible relatives in OAA cases – the need to document income, resources, and the degree of assistance provided one who is blind or permanently disabled. See Section 1902, State Plans for Medical Assistance, Public Law 89–97, 79 Stat. 286, Title XIX, enacted July 30, 1965, Social Security Act. See also Joanne P. Acford, “Reducing Medicaid Expenditures through Family Responsibility: Critique of a Recent Proposal.” American Journal of Law and Medicine. 59 (1979): 60; Seymour Moskowitz, “Filial Responsibility Statutes: Legal and Policy Considerations,” Journal of Law and Policy. 9.3 (2000–2001): 714–715; Renae Reed Patrick, “Honor Thy Father and Mother: Paying the Medical Bills of Elderly Parents.” University of Richmond Law Review. 19 (1984–1985): 71. 17 Patricia Strach, All in the Family: The Private Roots of American Public Policy (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007): 108. 18 Letter to Senator Smathers, Tax Consequences, Hearing, Appendix A, 34. 19 Letter from Marguerite Haas dated November 26, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, National Archives, Washington, DC (hereafter cited as NA-DC).

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for an aging parent – although the agency was different. The hearings were intended to identify these types of problems and recommend relief for taxpayers supporting their parents. A question debated in these hearings was how to provide support for aging parents: via direct spending programs, such as OAA, or via the tax code. This debate is of course an ongoing one in tax policy, and across the spectrum of parent dependency policies. Treasury officials at the hearing favored direct spending via the public assistance programs or expansion of the OASDI program either through coverage of workers or increased benefits.20 Julian Zelizer’s “tax community” included Stanley Surrey, assistant secretary of the Treasury for Tax Policy from 1961 to 1969; Surrey was a critic of tax expenditures, and tax expenditures were key targets in tax reform efforts in the late 1950s and 1960s. Surrey authored several studies of tax expenditures, with other tax policy experts, and these studies “highlighted the fact that the government spent money through the tax code.”21 Wilbur Cohen called the tax benefits for aged Americans “fiscal welfare” in a 1959 hearing, and preferred other means of assistance, in large part because “the vast majority of the aged are not in a position to benefit to any considerable degree from the special exemptions and deductions.” Such benefits tended to aid “those who need it the least.”22 In contrast, many committee members preferred encouraging support via tax benefits and helping aging Americans avoid the public assistance system with its associated stigma and direct cost to American taxpayers.

tax benefits for senior citizens Tax reform and tax expenditures are central to discussions of the 1966 hearings, and tax benefits for adult children providing support for aged parents. Tax benefits for senior citizens, largely through the tax code, were among the most expensive in terms of lost revenue by 1967.23 The first benefits via the tax code provided directly to senior citizens were exemptions

20

Howard, The Hidden Welfare State, 90–91. Zelizer identifies three major groups in this community, including “Social Security, Growth Manipulation, and Tax Reform.” Zelizer, Taxing America, 9–10, 181, 286–287. 22 Surrey echoes this critique in his 1970 article, and scholars, including Mettler and Howard, have documented this across the range of tax expenditures. “Tax Relief for Older Persons,” 1, Box 56, Folder Tax Reform, 1961–1964, Department of the Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, 1936–1972, National Archives – College Park, MD (hereafter cited as NA-CP). 23 Zelizer, Taxing America, 288. 21

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of retirement income, initially with railroad retirement income and OASI in 1948. Few Americans paid income taxes before World War II (just 18 percent of the paid labor force), but that shifted in the war years and individual income taxes became a significant source of tax revenue. Sixty-four percent of the American labor force paid income taxes during the war years.24 Before then, people with moderate incomes did not pay income taxes, and thus the exemptions were less critical.25 A double personal exemption for the aged was enacted in 1948, in part due to the declining value of income with postWorld War II inflation. All persons over the age of sixty-five could exclude $1,200 rather than $600 from their taxable income.26 Inflation significantly reduced the purchasing power of elderly Americans’ fixed incomes; the additional exemption would increase their disposable income. Six years later, in 1954, the retirement income credit was expanded, in part due to protests that railroad and social security incomes were receiving “special” treatment. Aged Americans could exclude any type of retirement income from their net income, thus sharing the tax benefits of taxpayers who had OASDI and railroad retirement income.27 Also in the mid-1950s the aged could deduct medical expenses at a greater level than other individuals; this provision would be repealed when Medicare was enacted in 1965.28 In 1959 all of these provisions were estimated to cost the treasury about $750 million in lost tax revenue. That would increase more than threefold in the next eight years, to $2.3 billion.29

24

John F. Witte, The Politics and Development of the Federal Income Tax (Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1985): 123–125, 136–137; Strach, All in the Family, 94–95. 25 Tax Consequences, Hearing, 4. 26 Witte, The Politics and Development of the Federal Income Tax, 134; Harold M. Groves, Federal Tax Treatment of the Family (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1963): 47–48, 50–51. The double exemption also applied to blind taxpayers. 27 The amount of the credit was calculated based on up to $1,200 in retirement income. Joyce Stanley and Richard Kilcullen, The Federal Income Tax (Tucson, AZ: The Tax Club Press, 1961): 16–17; Tax Consequences, Hearing, 4–5; “Individual Income Tax Treatment of Dependent Aged,” February 17, 1953, 1–2, Department of Treasury Records, Office of Tax Policy- Subject Files, GB8 Personal Exemptions, Box 60, Folder Treatment of Dependent Aged, NA-CP. 28 In 1962, all individuals could deduct medical expenses exceeding 3 percent of the person’s gross income (and prescription drug expense in excess of 1 percent). Persons over 65 were exempt from the 3 percent requirement (but not the 1 percent requirement on prescriptions). Maximum limits on deductions were also higher. Tax Consequences, Hearing, 5; Tax Consequences, A Report, 13; Groves, Federal Tax Treatment of the Family, 48–49. 29 “Report of the Ways and Means Committee Hearings on Taxation of the Aged, November 23,” November 24, 1959, 2; Department of Treasury Records, Office of Tax Policy, RG 56, Folder Tax Legislative Program, 1959–1960, NA-CP.

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Many Americans – not just those over sixty-five – benefited (and continue to benefit) from tax expenditures. The exclusion of OASDI benefits as well as the additional personal exemption allowed for the elderly and the blind translated into $2.3 billion in lost tax revenue in 1967, increasing to $2.95 billion in 1970. The deduction of home mortgage interest for homeowners totaled $1.9 billion in 1967 and rose to $2.8 billion by 1970. Deductions of property taxes, also for homeowners, totaled $1.8 billion in 1967 and rose to $2.9 billion in 1970. These two deductions provided significant benefits to those owning homes and holding mortgages. Deductions for contributions to charities resulted in $2.2 billion in lost tax revenue in 1967, increasing to $3.55 billion in 1970. Medical expense deductions rose more modestly from $1.5 billion in 1967 to $1.9 billion in 1970.30 As with many tax expenditures, programs directed at senior citizens tended to benefit those with higher incomes.31 In 1960, older Americans saved $711 million in taxes from the double exemption, the retirement income credit, and the provision for medical care deductions.32 In 1967, just 20 percent of all people over sixty-five filed taxes or paid income taxes, in part due to benefits in the tax system.33 According to Gerard Brannon, director of the treasury department’s Office of Tax Analysis, the key treasury witness at the hearing, a total of $2.3 billion went to 11 million elderly in the population (out of a possible 18 million) via the tax system. Only a quarter of that went to people with incomes under $3,000; half benefited seniors with incomes under $5,000. Seniors with below-subsistence income received no benefit from any of the tax provisions. Critics of these provisions argued that tax benefits were ineffective at helping the neediest of the elderly.34 Treasury officials also pointed out that these provisions meant that individuals over sixty-five paid substantially lower taxes than those under sixty-five, due to the combination of exclusions of retirement income and the double exemption. In 1960, a married couple under sixty-five with an income of $5,196 paid $695 30

Estimates of Federal Tax Expenditures, Committee on Ways and Means, Prepared by the Staffs of the Treasury Department and Joint Committee on Internal Revenue Taxation (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, October 4, 1972): 4–5. 31 Mettler, The Submerged State, 4–5, 20–26; Christopher Howard, “The Have and the Have Lots,” Democracy: A Journal of Ideas. 4 (Spring 2007): 48–58. 32 “Tax Relief for Older Persons,” 1, Box 56, Folder Tax Reform, 1961–1964, Department of the Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, 1936–1972, NA-CP. 33 Zelizer, Taxing America, 288. 34 The amounts would be $27,350 and $45,580 in 2022 dollars. Tax Consequences, Hearing, 5.

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in taxes, while a married couple over sixty-five with the same income, assuming their income consisted of excluded retirement and social security income, paid no taxes. Married couples over sixty-five could earn up to $5,333 in retirement income without any tax liability.35 The focus of the hearing was a different tax policy: tax exemptions for adult children who supported their parents. In these policies, the adult child, and not the parent, received the tax benefit, a point highlighted by treasury official Brannon and in other treasury reports on the issue.36 The tax system first rewarded individuals who provided support for their aging parent or parents in the post-World War II period. The 1948 IRS tax code allowed a $600 credit – deducted from the individual’s net income and not the taxes owed – to individuals supporting aging and needy parents if they provided at least half their parent’s support and if the parent’s gross income was less than $500.37 In 1955, the benefit shifted to a tax exemption of $600 (deducted from the gross income), if the person filing was providing at least half of the individual’s support and if the parent’s income was less than $600; that income level remained in place eleven years later at the time of the hearing.38 By 1954, single individuals supporting aging parents also became eligible for the “head of household” provision, again if they were providing over half the parents’ support; the parent did not have to reside in the same home. In this case, taxpayers could use the split-income practice available to married couples, where the income could be divided, thus placing them in a lower tax bracket.39 The 1966 hearings questioned whether these benefits were enough. Memo to Mr. Roudebush and Mr. Robbins, “Federal Council on Aging Report to the President,” 1–2, September 14, 1960, Box 41, Folder Treatment of the Dependent Aged, Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, CA18 Federal Office on Aging, NA-CP. 36 Tax Consequences, A Report, 12. 37 Joyce Stanley and Richard Kilcullen, The Federal Income Tax (New York: Tax Club Press, 1948): 102–103. Treasury official Brannon argued that tax credits actually provided a more equitable benefit among people of different income levels, but opposed them, as he did tax expenditures, because they complicated the tax code. Tax Consequences, Hearing, 14. 38 Joyce Stanley and Richard Kilcullen, The Federal Income Tax (New York: Tax Club Press, 1955): 53–55. A complaint was that while income tax policy excluded many types of income from taxes for people over 65, all types of income counted for the $600 limit. 39 The Head of Household provision could be used by unmarried individuals providing at least one-half support for any dependent the taxpayer is entitled to claim. Tax Consequences, A Report, 13; Groves, Federal Tax Treatment of the Family, 69; “Treasury Activity Affecting the Aging: Developments Since June 1951 – Draft,” October 15, 1958, 2; Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, Box 41, CA18 Federal Office on Aging, NA-CP. 35

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medicare and medicaid The hearings follow the 1965 passage and implementation of two major programs – Medicare and Medicaid – that would transform the role of the federal government in health care and would benefit senior citizens. While tax benefits did provide medical expense deductions for senior citizens, these programs provided a means for the elderly to gain access to health care and health insurance. Both were critical to older Americans, but Medicare, now largely a universal health care program for seniors with the expansion of social insurance, was more limited due to the continued exclusion of some workers from OASDI. Medicaid, if a state opted to participate, could provide health care for older Americans in difficult financial circumstances. Prior to 1965, health care for those in financial need was haphazard and varied by states, limited by both funds and a willingness to provide health care to the poor or those on public assistance. The Kerr–Mills Act, enacted in 1960, provided matching grants to states to provide medical care for poor elderly seniors. Its coverage was limited by eligibility, and as in the past, often excluded those who did not qualify for public assistance but could not afford medical care. Many insurance carriers either would not provide health insurance to older Americans, or premiums were significantly higher and unaffordable: “The insurance industry categorized people over age 65 as ‘substandard risks,’ because on average they were sicker and required more medical care than younger groups.”40 Just 56 percent of senior citizens had hospital insurance when Medicare was passed in 1965.41 Medical care for aged Americans was becoming a clear issue – both in terms of financial and physical health. Health insurance for aged Americans gained a broad network of support, including civil rights leaders, who were able to overcome the opposition of the American Medical Association and other groups.42 The result was Medicare Part A, which covered hospital costs, and Medicare Part B, which was a voluntary program covering doctor and outpatient care. Medicaid, an expansion of the Kerr–Mills program, was created to serve the financially needy through block grants to states. Termed a “three-layer cake,” all three programs were part of the Social 40

Beatrix Hoffman, Health Care for Some: Rights and Rationing in the United States since 1930 (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2012): 118–119; Jonathan Engel, Poor People’s Medicine: Medicaid and American Charity Care since 1965 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2006): 34–38. 41 Donald A. Barr, Introduction to US Health Policy: The Organization, Financing and Delivery of Health Care in America (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016): 151. 42 Hoffman, Health Care for Some, 122–126.

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Security Act.43 Anyone eligible for OASDI benefits was automatically enrolled in Medicare Part A and was eligible for Part B. Part A was funded through payroll taxes on current workers, and Part B was funded in part through premiums paid by those enrolling in the voluntary program and through general tax revenues. As with private insurance, Medicare paid only part of the costs, and a $40 deductible and a 20-percent copayment prevented some seniors from seeking care even if enrolled in the hospital benefits. Premiums for Part B were $3 per month. Deductibles rose to $53 and premiums to $4 by 1970. A 1971 study found that low-income and seniors of color were less likely to have coverage.44 Despite the limitations, the program did provide coverage for some seniors, benefiting them as well as their children who were helping them financially. Medicaid was directed at financially needy people, and included a means test just as other public assistance programs, including its predecessor, the Kerr–Mills program. The programs were a federal-state partnership, and thus coverage varied across states. Patients reported experiencing different treatment from those with other insurance, and fewer providers accepted Medicaid patients. Like OAA, it required periodic reinvestigations and eligibility varied across states. The programs certainly helped seniors to pay for parts of their medical care, which also helped children providing aid to parents, but it was limited in eligibility and coverage.45 Regardless of the limitations, both programs provided much-needed relief from health care costs for aging Americans but neither was comprehensive. As the next section demonstrates, adult children often helped parents pay the increasing costs of health care and living expenses.

voices of parents and adult children The Special Committee on Aging’s May 14, 1966, news release announcing the hearing was published in newspapers across the country and sent to numerous organizations – from senior citizen groups to institutions providing care to the elderly to academics – to solicit information and feedback. In the release, committee chairperson Smathers linked the efforts by adult children to support their parents – often at great sacrifice to themselves and their 43

Zelizer, Taxing America, 240. Michael B. Katz, The Price of Citizenship: Redefining the American Welfare State (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001): 260–261; Hoffman, Health Care for Some, 130–131. $40 is $373 and $3 is $28 in 2022 dollars. The 1970 costs translate to $415 and $31 in 2022 dollars, respectively. 45 Hoffman, Health Care for Some, 134–137, 142. 44

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families – to the Bible’s call “To honor thy father and mother.” He also said that “easing the federal tax burdens of such younger persons may well prove to be an important step toward improving the economic status of the elderly.”46 The committee also solicited testimony from numerous organizations involved in the issues of elderly poverty and family support. A notice appeared in the American Bar Association’s Bulletin of the Section on Taxation of the American Bar Association. The notice invited its readers – those working in tax law or policy – to submit ideas or suggestions on policies that would encourage individuals to save funds for their retirement or that promoted the “shifting of income from young, productive taxpayers to their older loved ones who need supplementation of inadequate pensions, Social Security, and savings.”47 These efforts – particularly publicity in newspapers across the country – generated correspondence from parents and adult children regarding the burdens of parental support and several referenced news articles in their letters. Fifty-two letters from representatives of businesses or organizations or from individual Americans seeking to speak to the issue were published in the official hearing transcript. Additional letters (three) from people who did not want their letters published are found in the records of the Senate committee. The letters’ authors lived in eighteen different states. None identified by race, and likely all were white, given the silence. While the letters are not a representative sample but rather a collection of views from people who felt strongly enough about the issues to write to the committee staff, they offer an important source of voices from different perspectives – parents relying on support from children or the adult children providing that support – on the issue of supporting aging parents. The letters clearly articulated a willingness to support parents, but they were seeking some relief from the financial burden it imposed on them and their own families. None of the authors sought to abdicate their responsibility to their parents, but instead sought some recognition of the financial burden that support created and some increase in tax relief to offset that financial burden. Many made suggestions about possible reforms, but the letters also highlight the financial and emotional challenges facing elderly parents and their families.

“To Weigh a Tax Break,” Kansas City Star. May 19, 1966. Copy in Records Related to the Committee’s Hearings, Box 30, Folder Tax Hearing Record, 19.16–1, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, RG 46, NA-DC. 47 “Senate Subcommittee Invites Ideas on Tax Changes Needed for Elderly,” Bulletin of the Section on Taxation, American Bar Association. 19.3 (1966): 81. 46

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One of the most common complaints was the income limits for elderly parents, and adult children in particular sought an increase in the income limit to enable them to take the dependency exemption. Even parents relying solely on OASDI could exceed that limit, as in the case of Harrison’s father in the chapter’s introduction. Marguerite Haas wrote Senator Smathers saying that she had claimed her mother as a dependent, and the IRS said she could not as her mother’s $80 monthly OASDI income exceeded the limit and she owed $133.87. Haas wrote: “I pointed out to them that it was impossible to live on $80 a month. They agreed with me but in the same breath said that was the way it had to be so now I am forced to pay them the money.”48 Helen Miller, a single retired teacher, claimed her mother, who had a $48 monthly pension from her deceased husband’s work as a postal employee, as a dependent on her income taxes. When her mother’s income increased to $55 per month, Miller was no longer eligible for the deduction.49 Mrs. Simon Williams wrote that she and her husband supported both her mother and his parents, in part because others in the family would not do so. Her husband worked two jobs to make this possible, but “with no tax break at all.” They also paid more than $400 for a surgery her father-in-law needed. “Believe me it’s really rough,” she wrote.50 Gerald Cunningham complained that because of his job one night per week as a night watchman, in addition to his $44 monthly OASDI income, his son-in-law and daughter could not claim him due to the income limit. They provided Cunningham and his wife a home rent-free for eleven years, forfeiting the rental income they could secure, as well as covering all expenses for the home. They could claim his wife as a dependent, as her income was less than the limit, but not him.51

48

The amounts would be $745 and $1,248 in 2022 dollars, respectively. Letter from Marguerite Haas dated May 16, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, National Archives, Washington, DC (hereafter cited as NA-DC). 49 $48 is about $447 in 2022 dollars; $55 is about $512. Letter from Helen Miller dated June 17, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 50 Letter from Mrs. Simon Williams (a pseudonym) dated May 19, 1966, 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 51 $44 is $410 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Gerald Cunningham (pseudonym) dated May 16, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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Others complained that the calculation of their parents’ income was based on somewhat contradictory measures. It was evaluated based on gross income rather than net income, in contrast to the practice in determining taxable income. As a result, the calculation ignored expenses that offset that income. Louis Provine’s mother earned $1,000 in income each year from two rental units, but expenses totaled $700. The IRS ruled that she had $1,000 in income, and Provine had to pay back taxes with interest.52 Parents living in rental space owned by their children had to claim the “fair rental value” as income. Elizabeth Miklesen’s parents lived in a four-room house owned by Miklesen and her husband. She wrote that they could not rent the space to anyone else, given its basic features, “unless you could find two old people who would live as my parents do,” but regardless had to include that in her parents’ income. They could not afford to rent an apartment for her parents.53 Hannah Schneider also could not claim her mother as a dependent, as her income of $1,300 per year was too much. With the Medicare program soon to begin, Schneider was not sure she could demonstrate that she provided the required half of her mother’s support. She asked for an income limit of $1,800 and the dependency exemption for anyone whose parent lived with them. Tax relief would enable her “to make life a little more pleasant for [her mother] by not having to conform to a strained budget.”54 A parallel complaint was the amount of support required (one-half) to qualify for the deduction, an issue which appears in the survivor benefit program. Taxpayers had to prove they provided one-half of the parents’ support to claim the dependent exemption. As with Harrison in the introduction, taxpayers did not always have the documentation the IRS required, aid they provided was not included in the definition of support, or it did not total one-half of their parents’ support. Fanny Dorin described the many ways she helped her father who was in a nursing home, including medical insurance, eye doctor visits, and hearing aids, 52

$700 is $6,521 and $1,000 is $9,317 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Louis Provine dated May 20, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 53 Letter from Elizabeth Micklesen (pseudonym) dated May 21, 1966, 1; 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 54 $1,300 is $12,112 and $1,800 is $16,770 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Hannah Schneider (pseudonym) dated May 24, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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but it was not enough to meet the half-support requirement.55 Helen Freund was in a similar situation: she funded several improvements in the cottage her mother lived in, including new carpeting and a new stove, and paid medical bills. Her contributions totaled more than $700, but because they shared household expenses, it did not meet the IRS threshold. She strongly favored changes in the tax laws: “I sincerely hope that you will be able . . . to do something to make the tax laws more equitable for those of us who are not seeking loopholes, but do wish fair treatment.”56 Roy Otten and his wife were helping both their mothers financially. Otten had owned a daily newspaper, but ill health prompted him to sell it. His wife took a part-time job to help pay their expenses and those of their mothers, including $70 per month to pay for his mother’s nursing home care. Like others who wrote, a tax deduction would ease the financial burden: “We are not resentful of the fact that they need our help, but there are times when the load gets pretty heavy.”57 Amy Vincent, an unmarried minister, began caring for her parents when her father suffered a heart attack in 1937. She had no pension and her parents’ savings went to medical bills. She paid her father’s medical bills until his death in 1943. Her mother fell ill three years later, and Vincent covered her expenses over the next two decades. She had just $330 remaining in 1964, and “was at the end of my rope.” Nursing home care was too cost prohibitive, and in-home care cost more than her salary. Letters to the then chair of the senate tax hearings yielded nothing; according to Vincent, the senator responded that “it didn’t cost [her] anything as I had a place for mother anyway.” He assumed she had a parsonage, but she did not. What saved her was an invitation from a Mason home to care for her mother. While her mother now had care, Vincent seldom was able to visit her as she had no car and the trip from Philadelphia to Utica, New York, was expensive and required time off work that she could not afford. “It would have been a great help,” she wrote Smathers, “if there could have been a $1200.00 deduction allowed

55

Letter from Mrs. John (Fanny) Dorin (pseudonym) dated May 28, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 56 $700 is $6,522 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Helen Freund dated May 20, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 57 $70 is $652 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Roy E. Otten dated May 25, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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when they were 65.” Additional provisions for deducting medical expenses also would help. She did claim as many medical expenses as possible, but that prompted an IRS audit as her “deductions were ‘too big.’” Fortunately she had the necessary documentation, and her return was accepted.58 The support requirements were also important for taxpayers wishing to deduct medical expenses paid on behalf of a parent. The income limit of $600 did not apply for those wishing to use the medical deduction, but they did have to provide one-half of the parent’s support that year to deduct medical expenses.59 Those who did qualify for the deduction argued for an increase in the $600 allotted, a recommendation of the committee as well. Most spent far more than $600, and a larger deduction would help offset the financial burden. One writer who supported both his parents and his wife’s parents asked why someone giving $1,000 to charity would receive a $1,000 deduction, but a taxpayer helping a parent with $1,000 would not.60 John Raines, president of Diapulse Corporation, had the means to help his parents financially, but spent far more than the deduction. Both parents were in their nineties, and he paid their mortgage, utilities, food costs, and medical bills; expenses totaled far more than the allowed deduction. He was thinking more of the future, when he would not be able to afford such help: “I should hate to think what might happen if I was incapacitated and unable to do any of the above.” For that reason, he supported an increased deduction more in line with what people actually spent to help aging parents.61

58

$330 is $3,075 and $1,200 is $11,180 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Rev. (Miss) Amy Vincent (pseudonym) dated June 24, 1966, 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. Tax Consequences, Hearing, 62. 59 Tax Consequences, A Report, Special Committee on Aging, 13. The tax code would change in 1967 to only allow a taxpayer to deduct medical expenses paid for a parent “which, when added to the taxpayer’s other deductible medical expenses, exceeds 3 percent of the taxpayer’s adjusted gross income, and limits the deduction for the aged parent’s medicines and drugs to the portion which, when added to the taxpayer’s other deductible drugs and medicines, exceeds 1 percent of the taxpayer’s adjusted gross income” (13–14). 60 $1,000 is $9,144 and $13,000 is $118,876 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Roy Bergen (pseudonym) dated May 18, 1966, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 61 Letter from John Raines (pseudonym) dated May 17, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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Raines’ fears were the lived reality of several taxpayers who wrote Smathers. Many were supporting parents for amounts far exceeding the $600 allotted deduction, but were doing so either on very limited personal resources or by tapping into their own retirement funds. They in turn feared being in their parents’ position later in their own lives: aging and with greater needs, but with no means to support those needs. They then would either be a burden on their own children or face the need for public assistance, which many letters referenced as a fate to avoid. Lucy Morell had supported her 90year-old mother for twenty years. Now sixty-seven, Morell was tapping her only resources for retirement to meet her mother’s needs. In her published letter to Smathers, she writes: “You spoke of youngsters supporting their elders, but no mention was made of people my age 67 still supporting their elders.” She feared becoming a burden on her children, and argued that increasing the deduction would prevent making “us dependents in the future.”62 In a follow-up letter, she wrote: “All I ask is a little more than a $600 tax abatement.”63 A nursing home administrator described the case of a 99-year-old resident of his Chicago facility. She had been a resident for nearly two years and her son, a 75-year-old retired dentist, paid the $300 monthly fee for her care – an annual cost of $3,600. His mother had no income, not even old age insurance. But the son only received a $600 tax exemption. There were no other siblings to share the cost, and the son had recently suffered a severe coronary. The administrator worried about his ability to continue this support given his own health and retirement.64 Unmarried women emerged as a group that faced a particular burden. Much of the nation’s tax law was framed around the traditional nuclear family, including married couples, with less recognition of single men or women who provided for others, including parents.65 Never married, single women did not benefit from a husband’s (likely higher) income or

62

Tax Consequences, Hearing, 59–60. Letter from L. M. Morell dated June 21, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 64 $300 is $2,743 in 2022 dollars. Letter from A. Garfield Stensland dated June 20, 1966, 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. This was the second letter Stensland sent; the first was published in the professional letter section of the hearing summary. Tax Consequences, Hearing, 45–46. 65 Kessler-Harris analyzes the family assumptions underscoring much of the tax debates in the 1940s and 1950s. See chapter 4 in Alice Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity: Women, Men, and the Quest for Economic Citizenship in 20th Century America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001). 63

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retirement benefits, and some did not marry because of their parents’ need for care. Maisie Crawford paid her parents’ mortgage ($88.35 per month), but otherwise her parents were self-supporting, living on an income of $217 per month, until 1965. Both suffered health problems, which prompted her mother to give up a part-time job and generated significant medical bills that Crawford covered. To meet the increased expenses, Crawford sought loans to cover emergencies, including one from her insurance. She took a different and less-satisfying job at the hotel that employed her because of the higher salary and the housing provided, as it “amounted to enough more to keep me out of the red side of the ledger.” She did not marry as she did not want to burden a spouse with her parents’ support, although she wrote that she would never admit this to her parents. She was forty-five years old with no savings, and looking at relying on OASDI for her retirement, and “I expect to continue living from one payday to the next due to the need for me to assist them.”66 Crawford appreciated the committee’s efforts to examine the tax laws. She did not mention current tax law, but her parents’ income likely precluded her from claiming them as dependents. Several letters addressed the tax benefits available to married couples, where dependency was presumed, compared to adult children, particularly single women, and the parents they supported. Some called for the double deduction available to married couples, but not to those supporting aging parents. Helen Miller, whose mother’s pension increase prevented her from claiming her as a dependent, noted in her letter that “if I were a man and she were my wife you know she would not only be a dependent but there would be a double deduction. . . . Why are single women with obligations given such little consideration?”67 Erin Cahill, whose mother’s pension prevented her from claiming her as a dependent, suggested that “perhaps let old maids living with a parent . . . make a joint return like man and wife.”68 Hannah Schneider, whose mother’s income prevented her from claiming her as a dependent, noted that “if single people such as myself are not allowed

66

$88.35 is $823 and $217 is $2,022 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Maisie Crawford dated May 19, 1966, 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 67 Letter from Helen Miller dated June 17, 1966, 2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 68 Telegram from Erin Cahill (pseudonym) dated May 17, 1966, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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to claim low income parents as dependents, the ‘affluent society’ we hear about, would remain only a dream to me.”69 Under the 1954 tax revisions, Congress extended the head of household provisions to single taxpayers supporting a dependent, including a parent. Married couples could use the “income splitting” method to reduce the income on which their income was based.70 A taxpayer was eligible if they did not already use the “income splitting” (and hence were likely unmarried), were able to claim the parent as a dependent, and provided half of that person’s support.71 Gerard Brannon, the treasury official who spoke at the hearings, said that this provision generally resulted in about half the benefits for a married couple who could use the “full income splitting.”72 The benefit included the $600 income threshold and the requirement for half support. Thus it benefited only those able to claim an elderly parent as a dependent. Medical care was a burden many children faced in caring for parents, and seven letters addressed it specifically. Elizabeth Micklesen wrote of the challenges of navigating the Kerr–Mills program in Pennsylvania. The agency workers wanted her to draw on her mother’s life insurance policy to pay a hospital bill for her mother’s three-week stay, but that only meant they had to repay that money. The hospital bill was eventually approved, and a fraternal lodge paid the $32 Kerr–Mills would not cover. “Thank God for Medicare in July,” Micklesen wrote. Although the program had just passed, she saw that it was relieving some of the burden on her and her husband.73 Vincent, quoted earlier, described the significant medical bills her mother incurred dating to 1946. She cashed in two life insurance

69

Letter from Hannah Schneider (pseudonym) dated May 24, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 70 Income splitting became federal law in 1948 under the “split-income plan, under which married taxpayers filing a joint return might compute the tax on one-half the aggregate income and multiple this by two to get the total tax.” Groves, Tax Treatment of the Family, 64–65; Strach, All in the Family, 95–96; Kessler-Harris, In Pursuit of Equity, 199. 71 Tax Consequences, A Report, 12–13. Stanley and Kilcullen, The Federal Income Tax, 1961, 9; Harold Groves, “Taxing the Family Unit: The Carter Commission’s Proposals and U.S. Practice,” National Tax Journal. 22 (1969): 116; Memo to Mr. Roudebush and Mr. Robbins, “Federal Council on Aging Report to the President,” 1–2, September 14, 1960. 72 Tax Consequences, Hearing, 6; Groves, Federal Tax Treatment of the Family, 77–80. 73 $32 is $298 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Elizabeth Micklesen (pseudonym) dated May 21, 1966, 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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policies to pay for a surgery in 1953 and exhausted her savings before the Masons offered her mother a place in their nursing home.74 A son paid $4,000 per year for his mother’s nursing home care and other expenses, and he and his wife expected to take on his wife’s aunt’s nursing home expenses as well. He did claim the medical expense deduction and the dependency, but it was a fraction of what he paid. Despite the burden, they were able to meet those costs: “So I feel lucky that my wife and I can take care of our own people under present circumstance.”75 Despite the economic hardships described in the letters, none rejected their obligation to support their parents. L. H. Doyle wrote: “I owe her more than I could ever repay, therefore she lives here without payments to me.”76 Elizabeth Micklesen wrote that “we will always help our parents, even without a tax deduction but I am happy you care enough to ask for a letter.”77 Franklin Williams echoed those views in his letter: “Whether there should be a tax incentive or not, I shall continue to support and give whatever care is required by our parents. Your statements are well taken, however, in that it can place periodical binds on a young family man.”78 Mona Crowley, who criticized what support was considered in calculating the deduction, accepted the need for her to help her mother: “I am happy to be able to contribute to the support of my mother, but I will never understand why I am not able to take her as a dependent on my income tax.”79 Those writing Smathers were simply seeking financial relief from the burdens that support created. The support also affected parents, who wrote of the burden their care placed on their children and their families. Ruth Brown accepted help from her son, her only child, although he was married and had four children. She had no choice, she wrote, but “if he could deduct this 74

Letter from Vincent, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 75 $4,000 is $37,267 in 2022 dollars. Appendix C, Tax Consequences, Hearing, Special Committee on Aging, 53. 76 Letter from L. H. Doyle (pseudonym) dated June 28, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 77 Letter from Micklesen, 2. 78 Letter from Franklin J. Williams dated May 16, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 79 Letter from Mona Crowley (pseudonym) dated June 20, 1966, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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expense from income tax, I would not feel so reluctant to take it.” Her $1,720 annual retirement income (she was a teacher) prevented him from claiming her as a dependent.80 Virginia Armstrong was living on her social security of $70 per month and a World War I pension of $27 each month and wrote “that you can’t live on that and have self-respect.” She lost her part-time job in sales, she argued, because the store wanted younger women working. She was supposed “to go on relief or live with [her] children.”81 Mrs. Roy Jones relied on her grandchildren for support: “The two grandchildren are encumbered with their own families and a government owned home loan to pay.” Her grandson had two sons and her granddaughter had four children: “So I feel myself and old home a burden to them.”82 Old Age Assistance was an option for aging parents, but many writers to the committee rejected it, or saw it as a last resort. Saving their parents from applying for OAA was a key reason some taxpayers provided support. Elizabeth Micklesen, who gladly accepted the responsibility to help her parents, wrote: “We carry them as dependents as we must. My parents would die if they had to go on relief.”83 Maude Jansen and her husband stepped in to help her mother when they found she received “county relief to supplement [her] income” while living with her brother. “I was shocked,” Jansen wrote, and “told her [mother] she could come live in our three-room apartment free or pay what she could, but I would not have her on welfare.” She also believed there were larger issues to consider: “We younger people pay taxes, don’t want increases, or we will give up and live up for the ultimate handout. For more independent action and self-reliance.”84 Dorothy Harrison wrote that her mother was forced to apply for OAA: “I cannot tell you how my heart ached the night I heard

80

$1,720 is $16,025 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Ruth F. Brown dated May 15, 1966, 1–2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 81 $70 is $640 and $27 is $251 in 2022 dollars. Letter from Virginia Armstrong dated June 2, 1966, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 82 Letter from Mrs. Roy Jones dated May 18, 1966, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 83 Letter from Micklesen, 1, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 84 Letter from Maude Jansen (pseudonym) dated June 20, 1966, 2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC.

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my mother crying for hours. To think that she had come to this: to be applying for welfare relief . . . she feels it is a bitter pill to swallow.”85 One Kansas resident protested the taxes he paid for public assistance programs to support other parents: “What I resent most is that I cannot do more for her and for my wife’s parents because the money is being taken by the government and used in many cases to support other people’s parents.”86 None of the letters included in the committee’s reports sought to increase public assistance or social insurance as an alternative to their support. Marguerite Haas resented paying taxes to support other programs when her own family suffered: “I am just a working woman trying to live a good life . . . but I am starting to believe that we are supposed to live like slums and eat beans seven days a week in order to support the Cubans brought into this country and to help support a war that really isn’t a war but we sure are losing a lot of our young men.”87 Most saw themselves as fulfilling a filial responsibility to their parents, and simply sought access to or increased tax benefits to lessen the financial burden their assistance caused.

committee recommendations Members of the aging committee developed a series of recommendations regarding the tax code that would reimburse people who did provide parents with much-needed help, and argued that such incentives would encourage others to take on that responsibility. Many of their recommendations aligned with the concerns expressed in letters to the committee: increasing the number of exemptions to two for each elderly parent a person supported and raising the allowable income for the parent from $600 to $1,200 per year. They also recommended that the income test be based on adjusted gross income, rather than gross income, which often obscured expenses incurred in the process of earning that income.88 The hearings occurred in a time when tax reform dominated the debates over taxation policy, and key targets of tax reform were the

85

Letter from Dorothy Harrison dated October 25, 1966, 2, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 86 Tax Consequences, Hearing, 54. 87 Letter from Marguerite Haas dated May 16, 1966, 2–3, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 88 Tax Consequences, A Report, 3–4, 17–18.

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numerous tax expenditures in the tax code. Major tax legislation in 1968 and 1969 reflected the continued belief by tax policy experts that the best means to ensure fairness in the tax code was to eliminate unnecessary tax expenditures, increasing revenue which would offset the cost of reducing the overall income tax rate. Individuals and groups promoted tax breaks to lower their taxes, but if such benefits were reduced, income tax rates would be lower and more Americans would follow tax laws: “When speaking of ‘tax reform,’ the tax community referred to two different actions: tax reduction to stimulate growth and lower the incentives to avoid taxes, and closing tax breaks that politicians could no longer justify on economic grounds, or that political interests were unable to defend.”89 Studies by the Department of Treasury and the Joint Committee on Internal Revenue Taxation in the late 1950s and 1960s clearly documented the cost of such tax benefits and their many stakeholders: the elderly, wealthy Americans, businesses, and other groups. Tax reform advocates were not opposed to all tax expenditures, but instead prioritized those that fostered economic growth and investment. A Yale professor argued in 1967 that “‘legitimate’ tax breaks were simply the provisions supported by the reformers.”90 Tax benefits for senior citizens were a target in these reform proposals, although the generous benefits ultimately remained in place. In its effort to reduce tax expenditures, treasury officials proposed eliminating the benefits for senior citizens and replacing those with a higher limit on untaxed income. This proposal emerged in the 1950s and was part of the 1968 and 1969 tax reform debates. The key argument in favor of such a change, promoted by treasury officials, was to eliminate the double exemption, the exclusion of social security and railroad retirement income, and a more generous medical expense deduction and replacing those provisions with a tax credit for income of any kind below a certain level (in 1959 the proposal was between $1,500 and $1,800; in 1968 it was $3,444 for a single elderly taxpayer and $6,000 for a married couple).91 Proponents argued that this change would

89 91

90 Zelizer, Taxing America, 167–168, 299, 302, quote from 286. Ibid., 296. In 2022 dollars the amounts would be, respectively: $15,272, $18,326, $29,405, and $51,299. Mr. Eldridge and Miss Wells, “Report of the Ways and Means Committee Hearings on Taxation of the Aged,” November 24, 1959, 1, Box 36, Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, Folder Tax Legislative program, 1959–1960, NA-CP; House of Representatives, Tax Reform, 1969, Hearings before the Committee on Ways and Means, House of Representatives, Ninety-first Congress, First Session, on the Subject of Tax Reform. Part 5, 1740.

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provide tax relief to seniors regardless of the type of income, and would reduce the tax burden on lower- and middle-income senior taxpayers, shifting it to the more affluent. Even critics of the proposal acknowledged that the plan would reduce the tax burden of many seniors with incomes below $12,500, both single and married, but it would increase the taxes of those with higher incomes; experts agreed that about 600,000 additional seniors would pay no income tax but 1.2 million would pay higher taxes.92 Another argument for the change was to simplify the tax code for seniors, which currently entailed a full page on the tax return. Surrey, assistant secretary of the treasury, testified in the 1969 hearings: “We have a hopelessly complex mass of rules for the elderly . . . even with the whole page devoted to them the Treasury has found that many of the elderly find it so complex they don’t even get the benefits that Congress has voted for them in the tax field.”93 Most organizations representing the elderly opposed the plan, arguing instead that all seniors should be exempt from income taxes. Treasury officials also opposed expanding benefits available to individuals supporting aging parents and argued instead that revisions to the Social Security Act, including expanding coverage under the OASDI program, were the best means to address elderly poverty. Brannon emphasized that the tax benefits proposed by the committee, and those already in place, favored those in well-off families more so than those in poor circumstances. He also argued that the tax benefits were inefficient and complicated the tax code unnecessarily. The son or daughter providing support gained the tax benefit, and there was no guarantee it would result in increased support for the aged: “Before urging new tax provisions, it should be recognized that a tax relief approach is erratic in its operation, often providing no benefit to those most in need. It is uncertain in its effect and the process of providing additional special rules in the tax law to achieve non-revenue objectives undercuts the simplicity and integrity of the tax system.”94 Whether tax benefits actually affected the behavior of individuals providing support was a point of disagreement between Brannon and the $12,500 is $106,728 in 2022 dollars. Tax Reform, 1969, Part 5, 1740, 1843. Statement of Stanley Surrey, Thursday, February 27, 1969, Tax Reform, 1969, Part 4, 1597. 94 Tax Consequences, Hearing, 17; “Outline: Treasury Statement before the Senate Special Committee on Aging,” May 17, 1966, 1, Box 60, Folder Treatment of the Dependent Aged, Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, GB8 Personal Exemptions, NA-CP. 92 93

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committee members, intersecting with that was the longtime debate between direct spending and tax incentives as effective policy tools, and what the role of government should be in the family. Brannon noted that analysis of tax provisions demonstrates “that there is very little evidence that most tax incentives greatly change the way people operate.” Instead, he favored expanding eligibility and income in OASDI, which would directly benefit the elderly.95 Smathers, chair of the committee, interpreted Brannon’s comments as replacing family support with government control; instead the government should collect more taxes from younger workers to provide funds for assistance “so that the Government can take care of the younger man’s parents the way the Government thinks they ought to be taken care of.” He continued that Brannon wished to “let the Government, let the Social Security, let some pension program take care of his parents; and the way we will provide for that pension program is to take the son’s money and let the Government administer it in order to help the son’s parent.”96 Brannon simply disagreed that additional tax benefits to the adult child providing support would translate into increased support for the elderly parent. When pushed by Smathers, he agreed that tax incentives and tax reductions could stimulate spending, as in the case of the 1964 tax reductions. Smathers pressed further, asking Brannon to consider the question whether adult children would increase their support if given a tax benefit for doing so not as a treasury official, “but as a human being.” Brannon continued to argue that recipients of those benefits may spend the money saved from the tax benefit, but may not necessarily increase their support of an aging parent, or may only do so with part of the savings: “the situation is likely to be something like this way: If he helps them now by giving them 10 percent of his income and he gets a tax deduction of $100 because this support, he might very well help them to the extent of 10 percent of this tax saving.”97 Patricia Strach argues that the limitation of such benefits is the lack of control over how families behave: “there is no guarantee that the resources will get to where policymakers hope to target them. . . . That is, tax expenditures make assumptions about shared income, shared resources, and the natural bonds of care that motivate individuals to act on behalf of their family.” But “there is little recourse when families do not act in accordance with them.”98 Brannon’s arguments speak to this reality – whether such benefits translated into more family support for aged Americans was simply not clear. 95 98

Tax Consequences, Hearing, 11. Strach, All in the Family, 100–101.

96

Ibid.

97

Ibid., 19.

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Brannon argued that a central tenet of the social security system was to provide the elderly with a means to remain independent, and that included financial independence. He pointed to the recently passed Medicaid program, which prohibited considering the resources of adult children in determining eligibility. In short, he said implicitly, tax benefits rewarded the adult children providing support, and tended to benefit those with higher incomes, but was the result increased dependence on the part of the parents?99 Studies of OASDI benefits and living arrangements of aged parents and their adult children demonstrate that as benefits increased in the 1950s, more parents lived independent of their children. In 1951 a study of OASDI recipients found that 26 percent of couples, 32 percent of the nonmarried men, and 39 percent of nonmarried women lived with their adult children. Those numbers dropped in 1957, when benefits had increased from $42 to $65, to 17 percent, 26 percent, and 31 percent, respectively: “Thus we observe that increased independent living has accompanied increased income for all the aged, and the rate has been faster for OASDI beneficiaries.”100 Dora Costa found that the decline in shared living arrangements between aging parents and children in the last half of the twentieth century can be attributed to the expansion of social insurance benefits and “the fact that Social Security benefits were given with no strings attached.”101 Policies requiring the participation of family in the support of the aged increased the dependence of the elderly on adult children, lessening their ability to be autonomous in their financial decisions. The committee members rejected Brannon’s viewpoint, instead arguing that tax incentives did achieve “socially desirable objectives,” given the significant influence of tax policy on the economy: “It is much better to recognize this and to make a rational choice of the tax policies which are best designed to further desired objectives than blindly to refuse to consider the social consequences of tax policies.”102 The committee’s report argued that even if individuals were not aware of tax benefits, they would be after filing their tax return, and such benefits might actually prompt additional support. If there was no tax benefit, and individuals felt the pain of paying taxes, they might limit or end their support of parents.103 American tax policy

99

Tax Consequences, Hearing, 16–17. $42 in 1951 is $480 in 2022 dollars, and $65 in 1957 is $685. Schorr, Filial Responsibility in the Modern American Family, 19–20. 101 Dora L. Costa, “A House of Her Own: Old Age Assistance and the Living Arrangements of Older Nonmarried Women.” Journal of Public Economics. 72 (1999): 39. 102 103 Tax Consequences, A Report, 2–3. Ibid., 5–6. 100

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provides numerous incentives to promote specific behavior, and the effort to encourage the financial support of parents is just one of many. This benefit directly relates to family, and how policymakers conceptualize family. In this case, committee members were implicitly arguing that the extended family, beyond parents and minor children, was the norm, at least in terms of support obligations. Such financial obligations were expected by members as well as presumed to be operating in American families; the tax benefits would reward existing practice and encourage the expansion of that practice because adult children would have the financial means to do more, and thus would do so. Senator Smathers notes in one of the exchanges with Brannon: “Therefore, isn’t it reasonable to conclude that a young man who wants to help his parents would come nearer to helping his needy parents to the fullest extent of their need if he had more money?”104 Little data existed to document the use of the exemptions for support, or how many taxpayers claimed such care, leaving the conversation largely grounded in ideological differences based on beliefs about family ties and obligation. The letters to the committee offer mixed evidence for this point. Most writing letters sought access to tax benefits, or increased tax benefits, but not all indicated that the benefits would prompt additional help. Some noted they could provide more than the minimum for their parents, but many just sought some help with what for some had become a crushing burden on their own finances. The sample is too small to provide definitive evidence for the debate, but it does indicate that adult children were willing to support parents, with or without tax benefits. The American Association of Retired Persons and the National Retired Teachers Association also favored expanded tax benefits for taxpayers who provided support. They recommended increasing the $600 income limit for parents as well as increasing the number of exemptions an adult son or daughter could claim for support. They also endorsed the principle of encouraging rather than requiring support. Ernest Giddings, legislative representative for both organizations, stated that “we believe in the traditional American principle of filial responsibility. Specifically we believe that the son or daughter as an earner and taxpayer should be encouraged but probably not be compelled to assume part of the support of a needy father or mother.”105 The chairperson of the Washington State Council on Aging also supported expanding tax benefits and encouraging support: “I believe we have gotten away too much from the ‘old-fashioned’ idea that there should be some responsibility on the part of children for parents.”106 104

Tax Consequences, Hearing, 19.

105

Ibid., 26.

106

Ibid., 42.

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A key argument for tax incentives for parental support was the “cost” (in lost tax revenue) when compared to the cost of OAA for a recipient. Contributions from adult children might save the parent from applying for OAA, the committee’s majority report argued, and thus their contributions resulted in a savings to the public assistance program. The report argued that the cost of providing OAA for a recipient in a state with a maximum grant of $75 was five times the cost of the lost tax revenue from exemptions. If administrative costs for OAA were also factored in, OAA would be six times the “cost” of the lost tax revenues, argued the committee’s report. On a basic financial calculation, it argued, the exemptions were a financial win for the federal budget.107 Treasury officials, in the hearing and elsewhere, focused on the lost revenue that increased benefits for the support of the aged would bring. An additional $600 exemption for a taxpayer providing for an elderly parent would cost an estimated $400 million annually. (Recall from earlier in the chapter that in 1967 the Home Mortgage Interest Deduction cost $1.9 billion in lost tax revenue, the property tax deduction cost $1.8 billion, and the charitable deduction cost $2.2 billion.) Raising the income limit from $600 to $1,200, even with the 50 percent support requirement, would cost $50 million in lost tax revenue. Excluding retirement income, including social security and railroad retirement, from consideration in the $600 limit was another suggestion. If still considered in terms of the support test, officials estimated it would cost about $50 million in lost tax revenue. If the income was also excluded in the support test, the lost tax revenue would be about $200 million.108 The Department of the Treasury was more supportive of increasing the income limit from $600 to $1,200, in part because the proposed revisions in the tax code would no longer exclude social security and railroad retirement income. Legislation included an increase in social security benefits with a minimum benefit of $840, virtually eliminating anyone receiving OASDI benefits from eligibility for the dependency exemption. To reduce that effect, the department favored increasing the income limit to $1,200. Treasury officials estimated that 65 percent of recipients could still be claimed as dependents with the increased limit, and with the retention of the 50 percent support test.109 107

Tax Consequences, A Report, 7–8. Memo to Mr. Brannon from Mr. Leahey, June 13, 1966, Box 36, Folder Tax Reform, 1961–1964, Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, EA1 Tax Reform, NA-CP. 109 “V-M Technical Explanation: Revised Tax Treatment of the Elderly,” 6–7, Box 35, Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, Folder: 108

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A criticism of filial responsibility laws in public assistance programs was that intrusive investigations to enforce the obligation of support harmed family relations and could decrease or eliminate any support the adult child provided the parents. Committee members argued that tax policies worked in the opposite way by strengthening the ties of family and making support less onerous than it might be otherwise. The report also argued that the tax benefits would make parents feel less guilt about accepting help from children, as there was some financial benefit for them. It rewarded families who fulfilled obligations to support one another in times of need. Avoiding government support would also strengthen family bonds: “To the extent that more generous tax concessions for such contributions fosters a social pattern of families caring for their own, without dependence upon government, there will be an increase in mutual regard among family members.”110 Betty Schwarz addressed this in her letter to Smathers: “Perhaps if special attention were given to this matter, there would be better relations between children and aged parents, and perhaps some people would be dropped off the welfare rolls.”111 The committee’s recommendations largely paralleled the concerns raised by parents and children in the letters and hearings. The final report named seven recommendations, but prioritized three: raising the income limit for parents’ income from $600 to $1,200, calculating that limit via an adjusted gross income, and allowing the deduction of medical expenses regardless of how much support the taxpayer provided to a parent.112 The report highlighted the extensive contributions that family members made to their parents, noting that parents were “primarily the neediest of senior citizens” and the family providing support were those “in modest financial circumstances.” The report concluded that tax policy did discriminate against taxpayers who supported aging parents and changes in the tax code would begin to address that problem. It rejected the Department of Treasury officials’ skepticism that more generous tax benefits would generate more assistance, arguing that federal tax policies “exert

US Treasury Department Tax Reform Studies and Proposals – 1968, NA-CP; Memo to Mr. Brannon from Mr. Leahey, February 3, 1967, 1–2, Box 36, Folder Tax Reform, 1961–1964, Department of Treasury Records, RG 56, Office of Tax Policy – Subject Files, EA1 Tax Reform, NA-CP. 110 Tax Consequences, A Report, 8. 111 Letter from Betty Schwarz dated June 16, 1966, Box 30, Folder Hearing Tax Record, 1.16–1, Records Relating to the Committee’s Hearings, Special Committee on Aging, 87th–96th Congress, NA-DC. 112 Tax Consequences, A Report, 26.

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a profound influence in achieving or hindering the achievement of desirable social objectives.”113 The minority report, signed by seven of the eight Republican members on the committee, shared the spirit of the majority report. Its authors recognized the contributions made by family members and argued that this was a sign that the institution of the family was strong and agreed with the majority report’s belief that tax policies should encourage this “family responsibility” regardless of whether family members shared a household or not.114 They also concurred on the main priorities of the majority report. They believed, however, that a more comprehensive study was needed before specific recommendations were presented. The minority report spent significant space on the problem of rising inflation and its effect on senior citizens with limited incomes, a point made much more briefly in the majority report. The majority report’s authors acknowledged the problem of inflation, but the minority report’s authors directly linked the problem to Lyndon Johnson’s administration and called inflation “a hidden tax.” Addressing the tax code was not enough for elderly Americans, according to the minority report authors; instead inflation had to be curbed.115 The proposals to increase benefits for taxpayers supporting elderly parents received almost no attention at the hearings in 1968 and 1969 on the proposed revisions in the tax code. The published hearing record is comprised of fifteen parts, with the hearings occurring over a thirty-day period in 1969. The dependency deduction for disabled children was a subject of discussion during two days of hearings, and a few individuals spoke to the need for an increased exemption for those supporting dependents, including parents, but no sustained discussion of the benefits emerged in the hearings. Herman Rosanetz, of New York, testified before the committee arguing for increased tax benefits for adult children, like himself, supporting aged parents.116 Congressional Representative Lawrence Coughlin of Pennsylvania submitted a written statement to the committee, deploring the $600 exemption in place since 1948 for taxpayers and their dependent: “it is a sham, a dreadful hoax perpetrated on taxpaying citizens. To contend they are getting a fair break 113 116

114 115 Ibid., 2–3. Ibid., 29. Ibid., 30–31. Herman Rosanetz was a longtime advocate for the aged, testifying at numerous house and senate committee hearings regarding benefits for older Americans. He advocated for OASDI benefits for those who were 72 years old but who paid no contributions into the system, such as his mother. Tax Reform, 1969, Part 5, 1997–1999; US Congressional Record, Proceedings and Debates of the 90th Congress, Second Session, 114.22, September 27, 1968 (US Government Printing Office, 1968): 28664.

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with a $600 exemption is unjust.”117 But these are isolated and rare examples from the thousands of pages of hearing testimony. Despite the interest of those providing and receiving such support, and the limitations of the tax benefits for that support, those voices are largely absent from the hearing record. Despite the lack of attention to those issues, the income threshold and the deductible amount increased a bit after the hearings. The next major tax code revision was in 1969, and the income limit for parents increased from $600 to $750 of gross income, and the deduction increased from $600 to $750.118 While it would enable more people to claim the deduction, it was a limited increase; $150 translates into about $1,214 in 2022 dollars. But the premise of increases in both income limits and deductions was a key theme in the hearings and the letters. These changes, although modest, were part of a wider set of policies, including Medicare and Medicaid, seeking to address elderly poverty. Analysis of these policies underscores how such programs deployed notions of family and family obligations. Tax policy is a critical component of parent dependency policies, and committee members sought to deploy its effects even more to encourage and reward family support. In the process, they hoped to reduce the dependence of parents on public assistance programs, and its associated stigma, instead keeping such support within the space of family relations and away from government interference. Tax policies aimed at encouraging support of dependent parents centered on the idea of the extended family, where adult children supported parents in need. Advocates of these policies sought to foster such support to limit the intrusion of the federal government into the arena of family, as with public assistance, and the cost of support via direct spending programs funded by taxpayers. The letters submitted by adult children and parents demonstrate the willingness of children to help their parents despite significant sacrifice. They argued from their position as citizens and taxpayers seeking tax benefits for those efforts. Although proponents of tax exemptions saw tax policy as less intrusive, the tax system for these benefits required proof of dependency. Taxpayers wishing to claim the exemption for their parents’ support had to document that support to the satisfaction of the IRS, and had to do so each year they claimed the exemption. If they were not audited, it was not a problem, but as in 117 118

Tax Reform, 1969, Part 13, 4903. Joyce Stanley and Richard Kilcullen, Federal Income Tax Law (Boston, MA: Warren, Gorham & Lamont, Inc., 1974): 151–152.

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the case of Harrison and others in this chapter, it could be an issue if the IRS asked questions. In some ways the need to document dependency mirrored the investigations experienced by OAA recipients. A key difference from OAA was the agency of encounter: taxpayers worked with the IRS and not a public assistance office. As with survivor benefits, the dependency was not presumed. While encouraging additional support of parents was the goal, tax exemptions benefited the taxpayer, and not the aging parent. The limited change in tax benefits left adult children to navigate support of aging parents with little help in federal tax policy.

Conclusion

Parent dependency policies are an important part of the American social welfare system designed to address elderly poverty via family support. All three areas of policy analyzed in this book still exist today, in some form, and continue to direct the resources of adult children toward their aging parents. The 1960s proved critical in the evolution of these policies. Tax benefits underwent significant scrutiny, although with minimal change, and the 1965 Medicaid program expressly prohibited the consideration of family members’ resources of aged Americans – aside from their spouse – in eligibility for Medicaid. But discussions of family support continued, and debates over family support in means-tested programs such as Medicaid extended to tax benefits as some opponents of responsible relative provisions advocated instead for more generous tax benefits. The persistence of these debates, evidenced in the contemporary use of such laws to recoup the costs of aged Americans’ medical care, demonstrates the continued intersecting trends of a growing number of elderly Americans and the accompanying increase in medical costs required to care for them. The needs of aged Americans encompass far more than financial support and medical care. Programs addressing the full scope of elderly Americans’ needs require action far beyond revisions in the three policy arenas addressed in this book. A return to or resurgence of family responsibility provisions is not a realistic or desirable solution to address the needs of our aging population. Responsible relative laws persisted throughout the twentieth century, although states’ enforcement of support laws diminished in the late 1960s. Medicaid’s prohibition on considering family support stated that such plans could “not take into account the financial responsibility of any individual for any applicant or recipient of assistance under the plan unless 189

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such applicant or recipient is such individual’s spouse or individual’s child under age 21 [and] . . . is blind and permanently disabled.”1 The intent of this exclusion was articulated in the 1965 report by the Senate’s Finance Committee on the law: “Beyond such degree of relationship, however, requirements imposed are often destructive and harmful to the relationships among members of the family group.”2 The senate finance committee report also spoke to long-standing issues in the enforcement of responsible relative laws: uniform administration and the consideration only of financial support actually received.3 Some scholars point to the Medicaid law as a major reason for the decline in enforcement of responsible relative laws.4 While some states did elect to stop enforcing responsible relative laws in light of the Medicaid prohibition, or state legislatures repealed their existing laws, others continued to enforce them outside the Medicaid program. Not all states abandoned their responsible relative laws, and California policy again serves an example. California Governor Ronald Reagan – and later as President Reagan – was a key proponent of responsible relative laws. Prior to the repeal of responsible relative obligations in public assistance in 1975, the California legislature approved significant revisions to the law in 1961 – among the most liberalizing of all provisions passed in the postWorld War II era. Signed by Democratic Governor Gerald Brown, Sr., the law repealed support obligations in both the Aid to the Blind and Aid to the Permanently and Totally Disabled programs, and the support contributions required of relatives were reduced significantly in the Old Age Security program.5 The social welfare board staff estimated that about 70 percent Section 1902, Title XIX, “Grants to States for Medical Assistance,” Social Security Act. 1965. www.ssa.gov/OP_Home/ssact/title19/1900.htm. 2 US Senate Committee on Finance. Social Security Amendments of 1965: Report of the Committee on Finance, United States Senate. Part I (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1965): 78. 3 US Senate Committee on Finance. Social Security Amendments of 1965, 76–78; Christina Lesher, Andrew Wilson, and Kerrie Wesley, “Whose Bill Is It Anyway? Adult Children’s Responsibility to Care for Parents.” Estate Planning and Community Property Law Journal. 6 (2014): 266–267; George F. Indest III. “Legal Aspects of HCFA’s Decision to Allow Recovery from Children for Medicaid Benefits Delivered to Their Parents through State Financial Responsibility Statutes: A Case of Bad Rule Making through Failure to Comply with the Administrative Procedure Act.” Southern University Law Review. 15 (1988): 242–244. 4 Terrence A Kline. “A Rational Role for Filial Responsibility in Modern Society?” Family Law Quarterly. 2 (1992–1993): 199; Art Lee, “Singapore’s Maintenance of Parents Act: A Lesson to Be Learned from the United States.” Loyola L. A. International and Comparative Law Journal. 17 (1994–1995): 680–681. 5 Chapter 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, and 1999, Statutes of California, Regular Session, 1961, 4202–4212, Electronic; Memo to State Social Welfare Board, from J. M. Wedemeyer, August 3, 1961, Policy Committee Files, Department of Social Welfare, Records of the Social Welfare Board, Box 11, Folder 223, CSA. 1

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of relatives currently paying support would no longer be obligated to do so, and others would continue to pay but at a reduced amount.6 As anticipated, applications increased 61 percent in March 1962 over the previous year, due to both the relaxed responsible relative provisions and the removal of citizenship as an eligibility requirement.7 Forms asking for income information would no longer be sent to all responsible relatives, but only to those who appeared likely to fall into the income requirements based upon the applicant’s information.8 What was perhaps most important in the law was implicit, according to one staff summary: “This is the need to replace any destructive or divisive effects which administration of the responsible relative law has had with constructive treatment of the family relationship. If we fail in this, we will have failed in what is, finally, most important.”9 The 1961 law represented a major victory for opponents of responsible relative obligations. While not an outright appeal, it significantly eliminated or reduced support obligations. It was the most dramatic administrative change addressing concerns about family cohesion and emotional well-being. The Senior Citizens Sentinel reported that the law was “dramatically modified, taking into account the burden on sons and daughters” who struggled to support parents and their own families.10 Efforts to return to the higher contribution requirements began immediately after the law was passed. While the newsletter continued to report on proposed bills that would expand support obligations, it published virtually no criticisms of the revised contribution scale.11 The strengthening of responsible relative provisions under Governor Reagan’s administration in the 1970s was a clear rejection of the rights language of the advocacy organizations. Rhetoric regarding protecting taxpayers again emerged. Reagan was a vocal critic of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), fueling racialized images of the

6

Minutes of the California State Welfare Board, June 23, 1961, Box 10, Folder 202, 8–9, “Modification of Relative’s Responsibility,” Policy Committee Files, Department of Social Welfare, Records of the Social Welfare Board, Box 11, Folder 222, CSA. 7 Minutes of the California State Welfare Board, March 30, 1962, Box 11, Folder 207, 3, Department of Social Welfare, Records of the Social Welfare Board, CSA. 8 Memo to State Social Welfare Board from Wedemeyer, 1–2. 9 “Responsible Relatives in OAS – 1/1/62,” 3, Adult Services Division, Box 147, Folder J10 Responsible Relatives, Department of Social Welfare Records, CSA. 10 “$5–$50 Raise for California Folks Starts in January,” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 20.1 (1962): 3. 11 “Brown Blocks Attempt to Review ‘Relatives’ Law.” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 28.5 (1962): 2; “Stir Up Hornet’s Nest with Bevy of Bad Bills.” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 21.4 (1963): 3.

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“welfare queen.” He was a strong proponent of the enforcement of child support, but his administration also targeted adult children of OAS recipients.12 The Welfare Reform Act of 1971 positioned public assistance as a program only for the “deserving” and “truly needy,” rather than a right.13 The 1971 law significantly raised the contributions required of responsible relatives, ending the reductions approved in 1961.14 Arguments for increasing contributions again centered on family responsibility and the need to control public assistance costs. A standardized letter used by state administrators defending the law argued that “A responsible relative’s payment schedule has always been a part of the Old Age Security program, but the schedule was previously scaled to ‘token’ levels of contribution. The Welfare Reform Act of 1971, recognizing the legal and moral obligation of an adult child to support his aged parents, increased the contributions to more realistic levels.” The response continued that the “most important benefactor of the increasing collections is the California taxpayer.”15 Efforts to repeal the law began as soon as the law was passed – and legislators sought to repeal the law entirely and not just modify contributions. Reagan vetoed one such bill in 1973, and the legislature could not override his veto.16 Legislators successfully repealed the law, signed by Democratic Governor Jerry Brown, in 1975; adult children were no longer liable for parents’ support under the state’s welfare law.17

12

Lou Cannon, Governor Reagan: His Rise to Power (New York: Public Affairs, 2003): 349–350. On the racialized image of the welfare queen, see Ellen Reese, Backlash against Welfare Mothers: Past and Present (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005): 173; Rickie Solinger, Beggars and Choosers: How the Politics of Choice Shapes Adoption, Abortion, and Welfare in the United States (New York: Hill and Wang, 2001): 140–144; Dorothy Roberts, Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty (New York: Vintage Books, 2017): 17–19. 13 Cannon, Governor Reagan, 359–362; Welfare Reform in California (Sacramento, CA: California Department of Social Welfare, 1972): 7, 37, 47–48. 14 Chapter 578, Section 12101, Statutes of California, Regular Session, 1971, 1167–1168, Electronic. 15 Letter to Doris Winter, California Citizens against Double Taxation, from Assemblyman Robert Beverly, n.d., 2–3 and Memo to Ronald Kurtz, DSW, from Dennis Flatt, Health and Welfare Agency, April 13, 1973, Box 144, Folder 1, Department of Social Welfare Records, Adult Services Division, Coded Files, 1957–1974, CSA. 16 “Child Responsibility Repeal Vetoed.” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 33.1 (1973): 1; “Senate Fails to Override Reagan Veto on AB 57.” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 33.3 (1973): 2. 17 Chapter 1136, Article 8, Statutes of California, Regular Session, 1975, 2812–2813, Electronic; “Big Victory Won!” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 35.4 (1975): 1; Indest, “Legal Aspects of HCFA’s Decision,” 236–237. The law did not amend the civil or criminal code, which still included provisions for responsible relatives. But enforcement by the DSW ceased.

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The expansion of coverage under Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) – now generally termed social security – and the implementation of Supplemental Security Income (SSI) in 1974 also contributed to the waning of responsible relative provisions. SSI replaced Old Age Assistance (OAA), Aid to the Blind, and Aid to the Permanently and Totally Disabled and created a national system of income support to the populations served by those earlier programs. Debate over federal versus state administration was a central issue in the development of SSI; Reagan argued for state administration. As with OAA, SSI continued to be a supplementary income program for OASDI beneficiaries whose benefits fell below the income threshold for SSI. The program’s design required states to provide equal benefits to those received under OAA, but also offered states strong incentives to supplement federal benefits. The federal program had no responsible relative provision for adult children for parents or for parents of blind or disabled children over twenty-one.18 States could apply relative support requirements to state supplemental funds, if the state opted to administer those funds, but few enforced those provisions.19 The funding formula for supplementation encouraged states to provide additional funds and prevented state costs from increasing beyond spending levels under OAA; thus states had fewer financial incentives to use support obligations to control costs, and the transfer of administration to the federal government reduced conflicts over governing authority. The result was a further decline in the use of responsible relative support.20

medicaid and relatives’ support While the exclusion of responsible relatives from Medicaid, aside from spouses and parents in specific circumstances, coincided with some states opting to either repeal support laws or simply stop enforcing them, the James C. Callison, “Early Experience under the Supplemental Security Income Program.” Social Security Bulletin. 37.6 (1974): 6. 19 James L. Lopes, “Filial Support and Family Solidarity.” Pacific Law Journal. 6 (1975): 513; Donald E. Rigby, “State Supplementation under Federal SSI Program.” Social Security Bulletin. 37.11 (1974): 27. 20 Edward D. Berkowitz and Larry DeWitt. The Other Welfare: Supplemental Security Income and U.S. Social Policy (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2013): 1–2, 53–56; Rigby, “State Supplementation,” 24–26; Alvin Schorr, “Honor Thy Father and Mother . . . ” A Second Look at Filial Responsibility (Washington, DC: Social Security Administration, 1980): 28; Chapter 1136, Article 8, Statutes of California, Regular Session, 1975, 2812–2813; “Big Victory Won!” Senior Citizens Sentinel. 35.4 (1975): 1. 18

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role of the Medicaid exclusion is unclear. Hawaii’s state legislature repealed its responsible relative law in 1965, viewing it as in conflict with the Medicaid prohibition.21 Michigan repealed its recovery law for OAA in 1965 and removed grandparents and children from its support law in 1970. The amended statute only required support from spouses for one another, and for parents of minor children.22 Other states repealing their laws included Colorado (1975), Hawaii (1969), Illinois (1967), Minnesota (1973), New Mexico (1967), and South Carolina (1976).23 The Medicaid statute was a reason for Hawaii’s repeal, according to Charles Indest, but the evidence is less clear in other states. The repeal of such laws or the decline in enforcement is also likely due to the increasing administrative difficulties and the question of whether such practices were cost effective, both long-standing debates around responsible relative provisions. Reagan continued his advocacy of family responsibility as president, but his administration’s efforts also prompted more states to rethink support laws. In 1983, the Department of Health and Human Services issued a ruling offering states the possibility of securing support from adult children for medical care, despite its clear contradiction with the Medicaid prohibition. Officials defended the ruling, arguing that a law of “general applicability” was required by states; such enforcement could not apply solely to Medicaid eligibility, thus avoiding conflict with the 1965 Medicaid law. Administrators also argued that a Medicaid beneficiary could not be denied coverage “if a responsible relative refuses to contribute or avoids payments.”24 James Scott, associate administrator for operations for Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), defended the transmittal in a 1983 hearing by the US House of Representative’s Select Committee on Aging. He echoed the above arguments and argued that the transmittal did Indest, “Legal Aspects of HCFA’s Decision,” 237, 240. Public Act 305, Public and Local Acts of the Legislature of the State of Michigan, 1965 (Lansing, MI: Speaker-Hines and Thomas, Inc., 1965): 579; Public Act 88, Public and Local Acts of the Legislature of the State of Michigan (Lansing, MI: Speaker-Hines and Thomas, Inc., 1970): 263. Public Act 87 of 1970 also ruled that room and board and other assistance by a friend or relative of an OAA recipient could not be justification for refusing aid (262–263). I have found no record for the reason for the change in law, although it could be in part from the Medicaid exclusion. 23 Ann Britton. “America’s Best Kept Secret: An Adult Child’s Duty to Support Aged Parents.” California Western Law Review. 26.2 (1989–1990): 363–364. 24 Robert J. Buchanan, “Medicaid: Family Responsibility and Long-Term Care.” The Journal of Long-Term Care Administration. 12.3 (Fall 1984): 19; Robert Pear, “Family Support of the Elderly: Workable Medicaid Remedy?” New York Times. April 16, 1983, L7; Robert Pear, “U.S. Would Ask Children to Pay for Parent Care.” New York Times. March 30, 1983, A1. 21 22

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not require states to mandate family contributions but rather that “the agency has merely determined that State laws requiring contributions for support [of] the dependent elderly do not violate title XIX, so long as” laws follow the above requirements. Requests from states, including Indiana, to enable the collection of such funds, motivated the policy clarification.25 Indiana legislators, still committed to relatives’ support as a fiscal control measure, were considering requiring contributions from family for Medicaid recipients. The state’s attorney general issued an opinion calling such laws a violation of federal law and then requested an opinion by the HCFA, and the transmittal was the result.26 The effects of the transmittal were limited, but legal scholars warn that the transmittal could prompt future enforcement in states that retain the laws. At the time of the hearing, three states – Indiana, Idaho, and Virginia – had laws “requiring family contributions under Medicaid.” Another eleven states were considering such legislation in 1983.27 Twenty-seven states never considered such legislation.28 Maine repealed its law in 1984 in response to the transmittal, eliminating responsible relative provisions entirely.29 Connecticut repealed its law in 1986.30 The 1983 hearing on the proposed policy change found most persons testifying opposing the shift in policy. Idaho, one of the three states that initially approved laws, repealed its law in 2011; Iowa repealed its law in 2015.31 Legal scholars have largely argued that the transmittal was – and is – invalid because it contradicts the intent of the Medicaid law and violates the rulemaking process. No cases have arisen challenging the transmittal, and few states are actively pursuing more aggressive enforcement. It remains an option, however, should states opt to pursue it: “Because neither Congress nor the courts have declared the 1983 Transmittal invalid, the door is always open to consideration of family resources for Medicaid applicants.”32 Most scholars warn of its potential use to enforce family responsibility despite the language in the 1965 Medicaid law.

25

US House of Representatives Select Committee on Aging, Medicaid and Family Responsibility: Who Pays? 98th Congress (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1983): 6. 26 Indest, “Legal Aspects of HCFA’s Decision,” 238, note 47. 27 28 Medicaid and Family Responsibility: Who Pays?, 2. Buchanan, “Medicaid,” 21. 29 Indest, “Legal Aspects of HCFA’s Decision,” 239. 30 Britton, “America’s Best Kept Secret,” 363–364. 31 Sylvia Macon, “Grow Up Virginia: Time to Change Our Filial Responsibility Law.” University of Richmond Law Review. 51 (2016): 295–296. 32 Lesher et al., “Whose Bill Is It Anyway?,” 269.

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Efforts to reform Medicaid and other means-tested programs in the mid1990s saw a resurgence in debates over family responsibility provisions. Scholars have documented the focus on parental responsibility for minor children in these welfare reform debates, but support for aging parents was part of these conversations. States sought increased discretion over programs such as Medicaid and AFDC to contain costs, and adult children again emerged as a resource to tap. A Republican bill introduced in 1995 would enable states to mandate family members of Medicaid recipients in nursing homes pay a share of those costs, reminiscent of the efforts under the 1983 Transmittal.33 Increasing family responsibility was part of the larger welfare reform package governors sought to enact in 1995 and 1996. The proposal offered by the National Governors’ Association did not specifically address family responsibility, but Donna Shalala, Secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services, raised that question in a 1996 senate hearing on the governors’ proposal. The proposal sought to repeal Title XIX – which created Medicaid and included the limits on family responsibility – and create a new program under the Social Security Act. Shalala argued that replacing Medicaid, rather than reforming the existing law, would remove key protections encoded in the original law, including family financial protections: “While the Governors may have recently moved towards spousal impoverishment protections, they still have not addressed measures such as family responsibility protections.” The silence on the latter raised the question for Shalala as to “whether the Governors can ask adult children of Medicaid recipients in nursing homes to pay part of the bill.”34 The replacement of Medicaid proposed by governors did not happen, and family responsibility for adult children was not enacted, but the recurring debates indicate the issue’s resonance with politicians and policymakers. The cumulative effects of the prohibition on family support requirements in Medicaid, reactions against the 1983 transmittal, and resistance to contemporary applications of the support laws by third-party providers rendered relative support much less significant. By 2021, twenty-four states still had relative support laws (thirty states had these laws in 2016) but serious enforcement was limited. Five states repealed their laws between 2015 and 2021 (see Map C.1). North Dakota, which saw

Connie Cass, “GOP Bill Would Let States Charge Children for Parents’ Care.” Associated Press. December 23, 1995. Electronic. November 5, 2020. 34 US Senate. Hearings before the Committee on Finance, United States Senate, 104th Congress, Second Session on the National Governors’ Association Policy on Welfare Reform and Medicaid (Washington, DC: US GPO, 1996), February 28, 1996, 56–57. 33

Washington Montana Oregon

New Hampshire Vermont Massachusetts

North Dakota Minnesota

Maine

Idaho Wisconsin

South Dakota

Pennsylvania

Iowa

Nebraska

Nevada

Ohio

Utah

Illinois Indiana

West Va. Virginia

Colorado

California

Kansas

Arizona

Missouri

Kentucky North Carolina

Tennessee

Oklahoma

South Carolina

Arkansas

New Mexico

Miss. Alabama GeoData Source: GADM Map Author: Kasey Wilson, MSU Map Library

New York

Michigan

Wyoming

Georgia

Texas Louisiana

Hawaii Florida

Figure C.1 – 2021 States with no support laws Alaska

States with support laws States ended support laws 2015–2021

map c.1 Responsible relative laws by state in 2021

Rhode Island Connecticut New Jersey Delaware Maryland

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courts rule in favor or nursing homes seeking payment from adult children, amended its support law in 2019 and specifically limited the ability of creditors to recover costs from family members.35 Recovery laws – or prohibitions against property transfers within a certain time before application for aid – do persist in Medicaid under federal law. Initially set at five years, the 2005 Deficit Reduction Act changed the time frame to three years. Individuals could not transfer property to anyone within three years of their application and be eligible for benefits.36 This also includes “gifts” to children or grandchildren, perhaps for education for a grandchild, or to a son or daughter for a down payment on a home. If the individual finds themselves in need of Medicaid in that three-year window, such gifts could render them ineligible.37 These laws mirror earlier state laws that prohibited property transfers. As with those laws, the goal is to prevent individuals from transferring property or assets to make themselves eligible for benefits. Lesher et al. argue that other more “covert” family responsibility laws persist. Texas, which historically did not have responsible relative laws, does prohibit payments to family members for services, such as home repairs, house cleaning, lawn mowing, or caregiving, among others. Payments to third-party providers or vendors are allowed, but not payments to family members for those services.38 The rationale seems to be that such services are a family responsibility, and not a service to be reimbursed by the state; in other words, such efforts are an in-kind contribution to their family member’s care. States have not renewed enforcement of relative responsibility in Medicaid, but as the introduction shows, contemporary applications of these laws persist by other medical providers.39 The Pittas decision

Sesha Kethineni and Gowtami Rajendran, “Elder Care in the United States: Filial Responsibility Laws, Judicial Decisions, and Enforcement Issues.” Journal of Criminal Justice and Law. 2.1 (2018): 68, 73–74; “Requirements of Filial Support – Repeal.” Laws of the State of Maryland, Volume IV, Chapters 540 and 541 (2017): 3160–3172, Archives of Maryland Online, www.maryland.gov; Montana Code §40.6.214, “Duties of Parents to Maintain Children,” (2021); New Hampshire Revised Statutes §167.2, “Liability for Support; Recovery,” (2021); West Virginia Code §9–5–9, “Liability for Relatives for Support,” (2017); North Dakota Century Code §14–09–10, “Domestic Relations and Persons.” The 2017 West Virginia law was repealed in 2018. 36 37 38 Lesher et al., “Whose Bill Is It Anyway?,” 270. Ibid., 275. Ibid., 274–275. 39 Usha Narayanan, “The Government’s Role in Fostering the Relationship between Adult Children and Their Elder Parents.” Elder Law Journal. 4 (1996): 385–386; Renae Reed Patrick, “Honor Thy Father and Mother: Paying the Medical Bills of Elderly Parents.” University of Richmond Law Review. 19 (1984–1985): 71–78; Kline, “A Rational Role for Filial Responsibility Laws in Modern Society?,” 199–200; M. Maureen Murphy, Family Responsibility Laws (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, the Library of Congress, 1985): 2–5. 35

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described in the introduction is one of the most-cited cases of these applications. Americana Healthcare Center v. Randall, a South Dakota case, yielded a similar result, with an adult son found responsible for $37,000 in unpaid bills for his mother. He was the trustee of his mother’s trust, and the health care center argued that he did not use the funds and income from the trust to pay his mother’s unpaid bills. The courts ruled, including the state Supreme Court, that the law was constitutional and held the son financially responsible for the unpaid bills.40 Scholars argue that, as with the 1983 transmittal and other efforts to revive filial responsibility laws, the reach of these decisions is not known.41

survivor benefits Perhaps the least change has occurred in survivor benefits. Parents continue to be eligible for benefits, as well as surviving spouses and children. The awarding of benefits still relies on the parents’ dependency on their deceased child, and the ability to document the provision of at least onehalf support for the parent. It did allow for consideration of dependency at the time a worker, if disabled, suffered that disability, rather than at their date. This parallels to some degree the concept of “untoward circumstances” in the earlier survivor benefits administration. It also requires that a parent not be eligible for another retirement benefit that is higher than the parent benefit under the survivors program, and benefits will cease if the parent remarries.42 The number of parents receiving survivor benefits has declined significantly throughout the century, as more people are eligible for OASDI benefits based on their own work histories. Parents receiving survivor benefits totaled more than 36,000 parents in 1960, declining to 14,796 in 1980 and to 3,670 in 1996. By 2018, just 1,063 parents received survivor benefits.43 In 2018, the average monthly benefit Robin M. Jacobson, “Americana Healthcare Center v. Randall: The Renaissance of Filial Responsibility.” South Dakota Law Review. 40 (1995): 520–522. 41 Jamie P. Hopkins, Theodore T. Kulowicz, and Christopher P. Woehrle, “Leveraging Filial Support Laws under the State Partnership Programs to Encourage Long-Term Care Insurance?” Widener Law Review. 20 (2014): 193–194. 42 “Parent’s Benefits.” Social Security Administration. www.ssa.gov. 43 “Social Insurance Programs: Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance.” Social Security Administration. www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/progdesc/sspus/oasdi.pdf. Data on race in the OASDI program is very limited, as racial demographic information is not collected in applications for social security numbers. Before 1987, such data was voluntary, although the form was not clear regarding that. So many likely reported data not realizing it was voluntary. Scholars tend to rely on other survey data for demographics on social security 40

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totaled $1,232.28.44 By 2021, just 917 parents received survivor benefits. Of those, 32 percent were white beneficiaries; 10 percent were black beneficiaries; and 53 percent were Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American, Alaska Natives, and Hispanic beneficiaries. The average monthly benefit was $1,392.55; white beneficiaries received the highest average at $1,517.43, black beneficiaries averaged $1,390.08, and the latter group’s average monthly benefit was $1,330.20.45 Survivor benefits remain a significant program for those who qualify, but the program serves an even smaller number of aged parents than in its first decades, indicating the expansion of access to OASDI coverage.

federal tax benefits Alternatives to a renewal of filial responsibility laws include more tax benefits, as argued in the 1966 hearings analyzed in Chapter 4. The chairperson of the 1983 senate committee on aging, Mario Biaggi, had introduced a bill providing tax benefits for people who provided care for a family member in their home, regardless of the level of support but with no success.46 Despite advocacy for such benefits, they remain meager for adult children providing support. Under the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, taxpayers may claim a parent as a dependent and receive a $500 nonrefundable tax credit. To qualify, they must provide half the parent’s support, and their parent must have gross income of less than $4,300 (excluding tax-free OASDI income, although that income must be considered in the support test). So while the benefit is again a tax credit, it still requires the support test and is less than it was in 1966. At the time of the 1966 hearings, $500 is about $4,667 in 2022 dollars, rendering the deduction even more inadequate today. Taxpayers may also claim a deduction for medical expenses for a parent, but such expenses must programs. Those surveys do not provide a breakdown of the type of survivor benefit individuals receive, including parents as recipients. Thus I am using the data from the SSA. I thank Julia Ezzo in the MSU Libraries for her help navigating and assessing the survey data. See Patricia P. Martin, “Why Researchers Now Rely on Surveys for Race Data on OASDI and SSI Programs: A Comparison of Four Major Surveys.” Research and Statistics Note. No. 2016–01 (2016): 1–14. 44 Congressional Research Service. Social Security Survivors Benefits. October 29, 2019. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RS22294.pdf. 45 Five percent of beneficiaries were unknown, and the average monthly benefit for that group was $1,252.54. Appendix E, Table E-5-A1-8, Social Security Bulletin, Annual Statistical Supplement, 2021, E.31. 46 Medicaid and Family Responsibility: Who Pays?, 3.

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total more than 10 percent of the taxpayer’s adjusted gross income, and the support test still applies.47 The medical deduction can be significant if an adult child is paying for major medical expenses, including residential care, but the need to prove half support remains. If an adult child pays 10 percent of their parent’s support, but when combined with others’ payments (such as other children) the total is half support, one of the adult children making contributions might be eligible for the deduction.48 Long-term care insurance is a logical solution to the problem of medical costs for aging Americans, but efforts to encourage its purchase have had limited success. The federal government has attempted to encourage such insurance in a variety of ways, and more employers are offering access to such insurance, although usually as a voluntary benefit funded by the employee rather than a full benefit of employment. Hopkins et al. estimate that such insurance funds about 7 percent of all long-term care, and just 8 percent of all Americans aged forty-five and older have such insurance.49 Such insurance can be prohibitively expensive, particularly if purchased later in life when most Americans realize they may need it. Requiring or encouraging adult children to provide support has a long history in the United States and was an eligibility factor left to states to use at their discretion. Many states did have such eligibility requirements, but not all enforced them to the same degree. States that still have filial responsibility laws rarely use them. Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance has significantly reduced poverty among elderly Americans, and the very small number of survivor benefit recipients who are parents speak to the program’s broader reach in recent decades. But many senior citizens need additional help, particularly to move beyond a basic subsistence. Many adult children do provide such help, either via direct financial assistance or in-kind help with a home, goods, or services. While programs such as social security, Medicare, and Medicaid, among others providing services to the elderly, have reduced the need for families to shoulder the entire burden, adult children and other family still provide significant help to parents. Tax policy has proven to be of very limited “Claiming a Parent as a Dependent.” ElderLawAnswers. March 6, 2021. www .elderlawanswers.com; Internal Revenue Service, Publication 501: Dependents, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information (Department of Treasury, 2021): 20-21. www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p501.pdf. 48 Internal Revenue Service, Publication 501, 18, 21. 49 Jamie P. Hopkins, Theodore T. Kurlowicz, and Christopher P. Woehrle. “Leveraging Filial Support Laws under the State Partnership Programs to Encourage Long-Term Care Insurance.” Widener Law Review. 20 (2014): 177–178. 47

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benefit to either aging Americans in need, or the children who seek to help them, and favors those with more resources who file and pay taxes. The tension between who should provide economic security for senior citizens and what constitutes economic security remains unresolved, as efforts to expand benefits demonstrate. Parent dependency policies seek to ensure all resources are considered – or pursued – before using public funds to provide additional support. Some scholars call for a renewed commitment to responsible relative laws, given the increasing costs of Medicaid and Medicare in particular. In a 2006 article, Matthew Pakula argues, “Though the legal duty to support one’s parents has been abrogated, it is time to re-establish a federal filial responsibility statute to create uniformity of enforcement and fair notice to adult children that they cannot rely on government assistance to support their indigent elderly parents.”50 Similarly, Sharon Edelstone believes that existing laws should be enforced: “Filial responsibility statutes and their enforcement may be the key to upholding the primary moral obligation to support one’s parents, as well as to saving Medicaid and Social Security. Until the federal government steps in to create enforcement mechanisms and gives the states guidance as to the legal status of filial responsibility statutes currently on the books, the statutes will continue to be unenforced.”51 Currently, third-party providers are the main groups using such laws to recover unpaid medical costs from adult children, and it is difficult to imagine that the political will exists to push for more federal enforcement of such policies in either Medicare or Medicaid. Even with the programs in place, many elderly Americans and their families struggle to provide and afford appropriate care. I hope this study, as I noted in the introduction, is a cautionary tale regarding support requirements for adult children and other relatives supporting aged family members. It is a story of budget cuts and expectations of family members justified in the guise of protecting taxpayers, while ignoring the reality that those programs support taxpayers. Support requirements affect the ability of the aged to live independently and with dignity, and narrowly define and measure the support that adult children provide. This study demonstrates the effects of the Social Security Act’s social insurance and medical programs, both Medicare and Medicaid, and

Matthew Pakula, “A Federal Filial Responsibility Statute: A Uniform Tool to Help Combat the Wave of Indigent Elderly.” Family Law Quarterly. 39 (2005–2006): 871. 51 Sharon Frank Edelstone, “Filial Responsibility: Can the Legal Duty to Support Our Parents Be Effectively Enforced?” Family Law Quarterly. 36.3 (Fall 2002): 514. Robin Jacobson also argues for filial responsibility in her analysis of the Americana decision. 50

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the danger that cuts to those programs pose to aged Americans and the children who assist them. These programs have not replaced family support but have changed it. My research has made clear that many family members do help parents in a myriad of ways – from financial assistance to help with medical expenses, appointments, and daily care. Requiring support resulted in invasive investigations that could harm family relationships with little real support provided. When survivor benefits were more important for parents, before most were covered under OASDI, support and income requirements prevented many from accessing those benefits. Tax benefits for people providing financial assistance to parents are ridiculously low, given other benefits we fund. Gender, race, and citizenship continue to shape people’s access to these programs and the support expectations for adult children. Many family members provide significant aid in varying forms for aged parents, but with little benefit from the American safety net. Our system for aged Americans and those who care for them is fragmented and limited, and the solution is not isolated policy revisions but a wholesale rethinking of how we support aged Americans with too few resources – and the people who care for them. One approach is to rethink how we frame the issue – as a problem or an opportunity. The numbers and trends are clear regarding the needs of seniors in the coming years and the caregiving and costs associated with that. But is this only a crisis or problem? Or do we have an opportunity to rethink the system of care – including caregiving, financial support, and medical care – for aged Americans? Envisioning childhood as a distinct stage with specific needs and programs is well-established in policy – why not do the same with more deliberation for our parents and grandparents? Louise Aronson argues that our aging years comprise Act III of our lives: “For most of us, Act III is long and varied. . . . And if we see and feel differently about old age, we can make some different choices, ones that change our experience of elderhood for the better.”52 Ai-jen Poo terms the issue as the “elder boom” rather than a crisis, and argues it is an “opportunity to respond from the basis of something that all of us across the political spectrum hold dear: our right to live with dignity, independence, and selfdetermination.”53 Both authors approach the issue from different lenses – Aronson as a physician assessing how our medical system can function

52

Louise Aronson, Elderhood: Redefining Aging, Transforming Medicine, Reimagining Life (New York: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019): 8–9. 53 Ai-jjen Poo, The Age of Dignity: Preparing for the Elder Boom in a Changing America (New York: The New Press, 2015): 24–25, 40–41.

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better both for seniors and those who care for them and Poo from a caregiving advocacy lens that seeks to expand resources for seniors and caregivers while also addressing the shortage of people to care for them well. Both argue that a major rethinking of our policies and supports is needed. The demographics of our population are not going to change; more Americans are living longer. How we envision those last years for them can change.

Bibliography

archival collections Archives of Michigan Minutes, State Social Welfare Commission, 1939–1965 California State Archives Earl Warren Papers, 1938–1952 Minutes, Department of Social Welfare, 1940–1963 Records of the Department of Social Welfare, 1908–1980 California State Library Indiana State Archives Minutes, Department of Public Welfare, 1936–1973 Indiana State Library National Archives – College Park, MD Records of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare Records of the Department of Treasury Records of the Social Security Administration National Archives – Washington DC Records of the Committee on Ways and Means Records of the US Senate Special Committee on Aging Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis Records of the American Public Welfare Association

court cases Adams v. Ernst 10 Wn.2d 640 (Wash. 1941) Bradley v. Hill 457 S.W.2d 212 (Mo. Ct. App. 1970) Buettner v. State Social Security Commission 235 Mo. App. 653. (Mo. Ct. App. 1940) Burgfield v. State Social Security Commission 155 S.W.2d 273 (Mo. Ct. App. 1941) 205

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Choate v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare 296 S.W.2d 189 (Mo. Ct. App. 1956) Conant v. State 4 Wn.2d 301 (Wash. 1940) Cook v. State Social Security Commission 183 S.W.2d 153 (Mo. Ct. App. 1944) County of Contra Costa v. Lasky 43 Cal. 2d 506 (Cal. 1954) County of Los Angeles v. Greta La Fuente 20 Cal. 2d 870 (Cal. 1942) Davis v. State Department of Health and Welfare 274 S.W.2d 615 (Mo. Ct. App. 1955) Dunnavant v. State Social Security Commission 235 Mo. App. 1107 (Mo. Ct. App. 1941) Gaeckler v. State Social Security Commission 236 Mo. App. 541 (Mo. Ct. App. 1941) Hardy v. State Social Security Commission 187 S.W. 2d 520 (Mo. Ct. App. 1945) Health Care & Ret. Corp of Am. v. Pittas 46A.3d 719 (Penn. 2012) Hooks v. State Social Security Commission 165 S.W.2d 267 (Mo. Ct. App. 1942) Howell v. State Department 249 S.W.2d 863 (Mo. Ct. App. 1952) Howlett v. State Social Security Commission 347 Mo. 784 (Mo. 1941) McBee v. State Social Security Commission 188 S.W.2d 349 (Mo. Ct. App. 1945) Moore v. State Social Security Commission 233 Mo. App. 536 (Mo. Ct. App. 1938) Morris v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare 504 S.W.2d 170 (Mo. 1974) Myers v. State Social Security Commission 181 S.W.2d 565 (Mo. Ct. App. 1944) Nichols v. State Social Security Commission 349 Mo. 1148 (Mo. 1942) Norman v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare (Mo. Ct. App. 1955) Oliver v. State Social Security Commission 184 S.W.2d 774 (Mo. Ct. App. 1945) Powers v. State Department of Public Welfare 359 S.W.2d 23 (Mo. Ct. App. 1962) Price v. State Social Security Commission (Mo. Ct. App. 1938) Smith v. State Social Security Commission 153 S.W.2d 714, July 8, 1941. (Court of Appeals, Missouri) Swoap v. Superior Court of Sacramento County,10 Cal. 3d 390 (Cal. 1973) Taylor v. State Social Security Commission 181 S.W.2d 209 (Mo. Ct. App. 1944) Underwood v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare (Mo. Ct. App. 1956) Velghe v. State Department of Public Health and Welfare (Mo. Ct. App. 1962)

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Index

Adams v. Ernst (1941), 116 adult children, 5 support, 42, 102, 105, 107, 152, 156, 168, 170, 172, 176, 189–190 tax benefits, 172, 187 type of benefit, 18 voices, 24, 26, 95, 106, 157, 167–178, 183, 187, see aged Americans, voices Advisory Council, Social Security Administration, 23, 124–130, 154 aged Americans demographics, 2 dependency, 17, 86 economic security, 6, 14, 82, 127, 129, 131, 157, 159, 162, 180, 189 economice security, 72 health care, 1, 3, 167, 174, 175 independence, 182 of color, 18 poverty rates, 3 tax benefits, 26, 179 voices, 26, 95, 102, 107, 157, 178, 187 agricultural workers, 9, 123, 128, 130 Aid to Dependent Children (ADC), 8, 20, 35 Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), 79, 191 Altmeyer, Arthur, 124, 127, 131 Americana Healthcare Center v. Randall (1994), 199 Baetich v. Hobby (1954), 149 Bond, Floyd, 71, 83, 86 Brannon, Gerard, 164, 175, 183

Brown, J. Douglas, 124, 125, 127, 129, 130 Brown, Michael, 7, 36, 51 Buettner v. Social Security Commission (1944), 110 Buettner v. State Social Security Commission (1940), 116 Bureau of Public Assistance (BPA), 10, 58, 65, 101 California, 2, 20, 22, 37, 55, 70, 78, 84, 87, 88, 90, 93, 98, 108, 115, 192 Proposition 4 (1948), 43, 56, 80, 82, 90 California Council for the Blind (CCB), 80 California League of Senior Citizens. See California Committee for Old Age Pensions (CCOAP) California Taxpayers’ Association (CTA), 22, 82, 83, 86 California Taxpayers’ Association (CTA), 52, 53, 57, 71, 72 Canaday, Margot, 16 Citizens Committee for Old Age Pensions (CCOAP), 25, 55, 57, 71, 72, 78, 79, 84, 88, 90, 97, 118 citizenship, 20, 191 Cohen, Wilbur, 162 Colorado, 194 Connecticut, 108, 195 County of Contra Costa v. Lasky (1954), 116 County of Los Angeles v. Greta La Fuente (1942), 115 court challenges, 22, 25, 80, 95, 118

220

Index Davis v. State Department of Health and Welfare (1955), 117 Democratic Party, 22 Department of Treasury, U.S., 23, 157, 164, 179, 185 dependency definition, 17 documentation, 17 measures, 4, 23 presumption, 161, 188 dependent parents, 4, 6, 8, 12, 17, 26, 131, 159, 187 domestic workers, 9, 123, 128, 130 Dunnavant v. State Social Security Commission (1941), 114 Ellen Reese, 20 fair hearings, 22, 25, 45–46, 80, 94, 95 advocacy groups and, 45–46 numbers, 96, 98 state discretion, 96 family, 93, see gender conceptualization of family, 12, 14, 92–95, 128, 129, 145, 157, 183, 187 conflict, 12, 13, 15, 92–95, 104, 115 dual system of family law, 15, 18 extended family, 183, 187 state regulation, 14, 18, 138 traditional nuclear family, 91, 92–95, 127, 136, 158 versus public support, 14, 27, 31, 32, 37, 56, 68, 72, 181, 183, 185 federal authority, 21, 193 conflict, 31, 59 resistance, 24, 28, 37, 43 Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA), 30 fiscal control, 13, 14, 21, 22, 24, 29, 39, 40, 68, 84 Florida, 1 Fox, Cybelle, 36 Gaeckler v. State Social Security Commission (1941), 113 gender, 12, 18, 87, 126, 127, 128, 136, 159, see family daughters-in-law, 93, 94 marriage, 8, 138 married daughters, 93–95 married daughters, sons-in-law, 93

221

married daughters, sons-in-law, 12, 32, 93, 94, 99, 105, 110, 113, 115, 116 unmarried women, 173, 174 Georgia, 37, 43, 73 Hardy v. State Social Security Commission (1945), 112 Hartog, Hendrik, 15 Hawaii, 194 Hearings in Public Assistance, 45–46 home rule, 21, 22, 24, 29, 49, 60, 62, 67 Hooks v. State Social Security Commission (1942), 112, 115 House Ways and Means Committee, U.S. House, 7 Howard, Christopher, 26, 158 Howlett v. State Social Security Commission (1941), 111 Idaho, 195 Illinois, 98, 108, 118, 194 Indiana, 22, 28, 43, 59, 64, 66, 68, 69, 70, 75, 82, 90, 195 Internal Revenue Service (IRS), 156, 187 Iowa, 108, 195 Kentucky, 126 Kessler-Harris, Alice, 121, 127, 131 local officials, 57–67 discretion, 89–90 Lowrey, Perrin, 120, 142 Maine, 47, 48, 61, 66, 195 Maryland, 85, 99 Massachusetts, 100, 126 McLain, George, 72, 78, 79, 83, 86, 88, 97 means tested, 85 Medicaid, 3, 187, 193–198 prohibition on family support, 27, 189–190 transmittal, 189–190 Medicare, 3, 175, 187, 193–198 methods, 20–23 Mettler, Suzanne, 16, 158 Mexican American people, 20, 37 Mexican immigrants, 20 Michelmore, Molly, 6, 51 Michigan, 49, 62, 73, 75, 85, 108, 194 military benefits, 4, 135 Minnesota, 108, 194

222

Index

Missouri, 22, 35, 45–46, 51, 98, 100, 108 Moore v. State Social Security Commission (1938), 109 Moran, Rachel, 32, 159 Myers v. State Social Security Commission (1944), 117 National Federation for the Blind (NFB), 80 National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO), 25, 79, 83 Nevada, 22, 81 New Deal programs, 13, 22, 44, 49 New Mexico, 194 Nichols v. State Social Security Commission (1941), 113 Nichols v. State Social Security Commission (1942), 116 North Dakota, 2, 40, 41, 42, 94, 99 occupational exclusions. See Social Security Act of 1935 Office of General Counsel, 58 Ohio, 100 Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI), 4, 7, 17, 51, 84, 121 Old Age Assistance (OAA), 4, 18, 108, 118, 158, 177, 184, 193 administration, varied, 17, 59 backlash, 37 beneficaries of color, 18 beneficiaries of color, 18, 36, 126 caseloads and appropriations, 73 citizenship, 37 confusion with contributory benefits, 85, 88 eligibility, 31 financial partnership, 29 means tested, 31, 88 state discretion, 31 Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI), 3, 121, 159, 164, 193 Oregon, 108 parent dependency policies, 4, 5, 11, 19, 160, 187, 202, see responsible relative laws, survivor benefits, tax benefits administration, varied, 17 definition, 4 Pennsylvania, 1 pension movements, 22, 82 pension organizations, 78

pension philosophy, 51, 81, 84 property lien laws, 24, 31, 67, 68–70, 72 property transfers, 68–70, 78, 95, 102, 116, 117, 198 public assistance, 35, 158 backlash against, 24, 35 caseloads and appropriations, 38, 39, 41, 72 federal aid, 21, 30 federal funding, 58 means test, 167 philosophy, 64 right to, 24, 30, 37, 64, 108, 111, 191 race, 20, 36 labor needs, 36 lower benefits, 23, 37 lower grants, 19 occupational exclusions, 9 Old Age Assistance (OAA), 36 Reagan, Ronald, 72, 109, 190, 191, 192, 193, 194 recovery laws, 24, 31, 67, 68–70, 72, 73, 198 Reese, Ellen, 37 Republican Party, 22, 39, 45 responsible relative laws, 1–2, 4, 23 administration, varied, 24, 62, 190 as fiscal control, 35, 39, 41, 43, 50, 57, 192 availability principle, 61, 190 cost of repeal, 56 decline in enforcement, 27, 190, 193, 196 family conflict, 32, 92 fictitious income, 62, 64, 90 geography, 21, 33 history, 29, 33 investigations, 31, 61, 90, 185 legislative reviews, 39, 43 moral obligation, 31, 47, 56, 110 opponents, 14, 22, 24, 191 proponents, 14, 43, 52, 78 repeal, 43, 50, 78, 190, 192, 194 resistance, 24, 78 resurgence, 35, 191, 196, 202 state discretion, 17, 20, 29, 196 state regulation, 92–95, 160 states with no responsible relative laws, 21, 23, 50 Schorr, Alvin, 87, 152, 153 Smathers, George, 157, 167, 181, 183, 185

Index Social Security Act of 1935, 4, 77 1939 amendments, 144 1950 amendments, 141, 143, 145, 147 1959 amendments, 143 discourage responsible relative laws, 33 discrimination, 19, 126, 154 family obligations, 5, 12, 132–135, 201 occupational exclusions, 8, 18, 36, 123, 126, 128, 130 relationship between OAA and OASI, 5, 125, 126, 132–135 Social Security Administration (SSA), 20, 42, 59–63 approve state plans, 58 discourage responsible relative laws, 64, 72 federal reviews, 50, 59–63, 67 reviews, 99 Social Security Bulletin, 21 South Carolina, 194 South Dakota, 2, 22, 38, 40, 42, 70, 108, 199 Special Committee on Aging, U.S. Senate, 23, 26, 156, 157, 167 minority report, 186 recommendations, 178, 185 Strach, Patricia, 8, 32, 161, 181 Supplemental Security Income (SSI), 3, 27, 152, 193 Surrey, Stanley, 162, 180 survivor benefits, 4, 18, 25, 199 application, 145 beneficiaries of color, 132–135, 154, 200 chiefly dependent, 150, 151 children, 121, 126, 137, 139 contradictory claims, 146 dependency measures, 25, 121, 144 dependency, measures, 26 dependency, presumption of, 122, 137, 139, 141 dependency, proof of, 121, 144, 146, 152 divorced wives, 142 equity, 130, 138, 152 half support, 121 husbands, 128, 145 intent, 139, 140 intent to support, 120, 149 limited interruption, 139, 140 living with, 136, 142, 143 lump sum death benefit, 143, 146, 147

223

means test, 136, 150–152 military, 133 mother, 139, 141, 147 numbers, 122, 152, 153, 199 parents, 121, 122, 128 state law, 138 untoward circumstances, 17, 148 wholly dependent, 122, 144, 148, 150 widows, 126, 128, 129, 142 wives, 121, 128 Swoap v. Superior Court of Sacramento County (1973), 108 Tani, Karen, 24, 59, 108 tax benefits, 18 adult children, 19, 158, 165, 200 aged Americans, 158, 164 categories of family, 161 dependency, documentation, 156, 158, 160 head of household, 165, 175 hidden, 157 lost tax revenue, 163, 164, 179, 184 requirements, 172 tax expenditures, 8, 17, 26, 162, 179 tax community, 7, 132, 162 tax hearings, 186 1966 hearings, 157, 168 tax policy, 6, 26 audits, 161, 172 categories of family, 173, 174 incentive for behavior, 180 incentive for behaviors, 26 incentives for behavior, 157, 158, 182 tax reform, 8, 180, 184 taxpayers, 8, 37, 158, 178, 192 “the taxpayer,” 50, 24, 43, 51, 56, 72, 119 legitimate, 78 Texas, 198 type of benefit, 4, 6, 7, 16, 25, 153 contributory versus public assistance, 6, 7, 16, 18, 51, 122, 130, 132, 136, 145, 151, 153 Utah, 72 Washington, 22, 72, 75, 78, 98, 108, 116 Washington Pension Union (WPU), 25, 78, 81, 97, 111, 118

224

Index

Ways and Means Committee, U.S. House, 23, 130, 154 Welfare Investigation Commission, Indiana, 43, 45–46, 58, 66 report, 28

welfare rights movement, 25, 79–84 Witte, Edwin, 124, 129 Works Progress Administration, 13 Zelizer, Julian, 7, 8, 162