Supreme Judicial Court -- January 5, 2012
Facts: Legal resident aliens filed a class action in the county court challenging a legislative appropriation excluding them from eligibility for the state's health insurance program. Commonwealth Care is a health care program initiated by the state that provides structured premium assistance for low-income Massachusetts residents. Both State and Federal funds are used to provide premium assistance for enrollees. Individuals eligible for Federal benefits initially received partial reimbursement from the Federal government, leaving those that were ineligible wholly dependent upon the State subsidies.
In 2009, a legislative appropriation, St.2009, c. 65, § 31 (a), was enacted excluding all aliens who are federally ineligible under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) from participation in Commonwealth Care. 29,000 legal immigrants were left without premium assistance benefits and forced into a partially-subsidized, insurance plan for immigrants that had been dis-enrolled. The Supreme Judicial Court determined that where the "State acts on its own authority, it cannot shelter behind the existence of Congress's plenary authority" and since its discrimination is based on alienage and national origin it should be subjected to strict scrutiny review and remanded to the county court. On remand, Plaintiffs moved for partial summary judgment and the single justice reported the matter to the full court.
Issue: Whether the 2009 legislative appropriation § 31 (a), which excluded non-citizen immigrants, ineligible for federally-funded benefits, from the State subsidized health care program, violated the legal aliens' equal protection rights under the state constitution.
Yes. Applying strict scrutiny analysis, the appropriation discriminated against the Plaintiff's and violated their rights to equal protection. The Commonwealth was not required to apply Federal eligibility classification to their health care program and for three years provided benefits to qualified aliens without any suggestion that such benefits were inconsistent with PRWORA. Where Congress has plenary authority under the United States Constitution they can legislate the rights and benefits for aliens present in this country, and their immigration policy is only subject to rational basis review. However, a State's classifications based on alienage are inherently suspect and subject to close judicial scrutiny, requiring them to demonstrate that their race-based discrimination was narrowly tailored to the conditions in their States. The Court held that the Commonwealth did not meet this burden.
Conclusion: The limiting language Section 31 (a) cannot stand. Its discrimination against legal immigrants, for fiscal purposes, violates their rights to equal protection under the Massachusetts Constitution. The Court, again, remanded the matter to the single justice with instructions to grant the plaintiffs' motion for partial summary judgment. (H.G.)
