Gonzalez v. Hobby

110 F. Supp. 893, 1953 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3182
CourtDistrict Court, D. Puerto Rico
DecidedMarch 31, 1953
DocketCiv. No. 6913
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 110 F. Supp. 893 (Gonzalez v. Hobby) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Puerto Rico primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Gonzalez v. Hobby, 110 F. Supp. 893, 1953 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3182 (prd 1953).

Opinion

RUIZ-NAZARIO, District Judge.

As the Court stated in its order of October 24, 1952, in this case, the Administrator, in his decision subject of review herein, concluded that plaintiffs’ status as legitimate or illegitimate children had to be ascertained as provided for in Section 216(h) (1) of the Act, Title 42 U.S.C.A. § 416(h) (1) and that, inasmuch as the insured individual at the date of his death, was domiciled in Puerto Rico and that, as of said date, Puerto Rico did not figure in the term “State”, as defined in Section 210 (h) of the Act, Title 42 U.S.C.A. § 410(h), plaintiffs’ rights under the Act had to be determined by applying such law as would be applied in determining the devolution of intestate personal property by the courts of the District of Columbia. He also concluded that under the laws of the District of Columbia only legitimate or legitimated children may inherit the intestate personal property of their father and that, to determine whether the children are so legitimate, the courts of the District of Columbia would look to the law of the place where the father was domiciled at the time of the childbirth, and would look, therefore, to the lams of Puerto Rico, to determine such legitimacy.

The Administrator further concluded, that plaintiffs were illegitimate issue because “under the law of Puerto Rico, children born out of wedlock are illegitimate” (Rec. p. 9).

Plaintiffs claim error in the Administrator’s conclusion that they are not entitled to the benefits of the Act within the purpose and intent thereof, and this is the proposition at issue, under the cross-requests for Summary Judgment filed by the parties.

The three minors, here, were born after the enactment of Act No. 229 of the Legislative Assembly of Puerto Rico, approved May 12, 1942, amending Section 112 of the Civil Code of the now Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

Under this enactment the minors here, though born out of wedlock from parents, who could not have intermarried at the time of their conception, were statutorily labelled “natural” children because their birth took place after the effective date of said statute.

The record shows that said minors were duly acknowledged or recognized by the insured individual as his natural children (R. p. 19 Exh. C).

It is the law of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, as it was at the time of their father’s death, see Section 767 of the Civil Code of Puerto Rico, as amended by Act No. 13 of March 29, 1945 and as further amended by Act No. 255 of May 10, 1949, of the Legislative Assembly of Puerto Rico; and Section 736 of said Code, as amended by Act No. 447, of the Legislature of PuertoRico, approved May 14, 1947, that acknowledged or recognized natural children are forced heirs of the parent who has recognized them as his children and that each acknowledged or recognized natural child is entitled to share in the devolution of the intestate personal property of said parent in like terms and proportion as legitimate children of said parent.

Defendant, in his brief, so concedes.

Devolution of intestate personal property of the deceased in favor of forced heirs is compulsory under the laws of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and said forced heirs even in cases of devolution of testate personal property cannot be deprived' of their legal share by the testator, who can only transfer one third of his estate to those-who are not forced heirs.

The minors, 'here, were adjudged to be. the sole and universal heirs of said insured individual, Ernesto Gonzalez, as his recog[896]*896nized (acknowledged) natural children, under a Probate Decree entered on April 24, 1951 by the District Tribunal” for Puerto Rico, Guayama Section, in Civil Case No. R-3,770,entitled Virginia Malave, Petitioner, Ex Parte. (Rec. p. 19, Ex. C.)

Thus, said minors, with respect to the devolution of the intestate personal property of their deceased father had, under said laws of the Commonwealth of Puerto' Rico, identical status to that enj oyed by legitimate children. ■

It would be, therefore, most inappropriate to conclude that the courts of the District of Columbia, in looking to the laws of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico to' ascertain whether said minors are illegitimate or legitimate within the purview and intent of the Act, for the application to them of the laws of the District in the matter of determining the devolution of intestate personal property of the deceased insured individual, could lawfully inject'the District Laws’ concept of such terms and flagrantly ignore Puerto Rico’s statutory concept thereof which is clearly at odds with theirs.

Under the laws of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico these minors since their birth have enjoyed the right (a) to use their father’s family name, (b) to receive support and maintenance from him, and (c) as of the time of their father’s death, to inherit his estate in identical terms and proportion as the legitimate children of other jurisdictions.

It is hard to conceive that Congress, in enacting the Act, would have intended to set standards based on other than practical considerations of actual social justice and fair treatment to those whom it sought to protect.

It is the Court’s opinion that those provisions of the Act, here in question, were liberally intended by Congress to protect those children lawfully called upon under the laws of the state or other political division, in which the insured individual is domiciled at the time of his death, to share in the devolution of his intestate personal property, whatever label or denomination be given to their parental relation, or at least that the rights of these under the Act are to be fully recognized, when, under said law of their father’s domicile, they enjoy a status which, though not labelled “legitimate”, accords them rights in no way inferior but in every sense identical to the rights enjoyed by those so labelled and who, in addition, would meet all the other requirements as to dependency, etc., imposed by the Act, the compliance whereof is not here contested.

The Act was liberally designed to protect both the insured individual and, in the event of his death, those who because of having “the same status relative to taking intestate personal property as a wife, husband, widow, widower, child, or parent” according to the laws of his place of domicile “shall be deemed such.” See last sentence, Section 216(h) (1) of the Act, Title 42 U.S.C.A. § 416(h)(1).

In construing said Section 216(h)(1) of the Act, Title 42 U.S.C.A. § 416(h)(1), in regard to the provision thereof which directs the Administrator to apply such law as would be applied by the courts of the District of Columbia in determining the devolution of intestate personal property, whenever the insured individual is or was not so domiciled in any State, ■ due consideration must be given to the provisions of Section 205(g) of the Act, Title 42 U.S.C.A. § 405(g), establishing the procedure for the review of the final decisions of the Administrator by means of a civil action which must be brought in the United States- District Court for the district in which the plaintiff resides or has his principal place of business, unless said plaintiff does not reside or have his principal place of business within any such judicial district, in which event the action must be brought in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

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Related

Rivera v. Celebrezze
248 F. Supp. 807 (D. Puerto Rico, 1966)
Flores v. Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare
228 F. Supp. 877 (D. Puerto Rico, 1964)
Vazquez v. Ribicoff
196 F. Supp. 598 (D. Puerto Rico, 1961)
De Jesus Gerena v. Folsom
161 F. Supp. 417 (D. Puerto Rico, 1958)
Gonzalez v. Hobby, Federal Security Administrator
213 F.2d 68 (First Circuit, 1954)

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Bluebook (online)
110 F. Supp. 893, 1953 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3182, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/gonzalez-v-hobby-prd-1953.