Modern biotechnology now makes possible issues that were not contemplated by Congress in the adoption of the Social Security Act. One of those issues is whether a child conceived by artificial insemination a year after her father’s death is a “child” of her father entitled to survivor benefits under the Social Security Act. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of appeals earlier ruled “yes.” In the recent ruling in Beeler v. Astrue, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled “no”, overturning a lower, trial court decisions and affirming the final decision of the Commissioner of Social Security.
This child’s mother used frozen sperm to conceive the child after the father died of Leukemia. The father banked his sperm at the University of Iowa Hospital and Clinic pending his undertaking of a series of chemotherapy and other cancer treatments.The father willed the sperm to the mother and signed agreements recognizing the existence of the child as his. There is no dispute that the child is the biological and natural child of the father. Then there is the legislative definition of a “child,” which is something different again. (One definition of law is common sense, as amended by the legislature)
Congress delegated the drafting of regulations defining who is entitled to benefits under the Social Security Act to the Commissioner of Social Security. The Commissioner developed standards which depend on state law determinations of rights to inherent where a parent dies intestate. Under Iowa law existing at the time of the Commissioner’s decision, the child did not qualify for recognition as the child of her father under state law and therefore could not qualify under the Federal statute. The Iowa statute required children to be “begotten” at the time of death. One could say the child in this case was misbegotten or latebegotten.
Under the rule of the United States Supreme Court in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc.,
where Congress has delegated rule making to an administrative body for the fleshing out of a statute, courts must defer to the final decision of the administrative body, if the interpretation of the statute is “reasonable.” The 8th Circuit invoked the Chevron standard in its interpretation of the Social Security Act. This is a case that is on its way to the Supreme Court.
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