Lee v. Gardner

267 F. Supp. 578, 1967 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8336
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Missouri
DecidedMay 9, 1967
DocketNo. 16123-1
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 267 F. Supp. 578 (Lee v. Gardner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Lee v. Gardner, 267 F. Supp. 578, 1967 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8336 (W.D. Mo. 1967).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

JOHN W. OLIVER, District Judge.

This is an action to review a final decision of the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare denying plaintiff’s application to establish a period of disability and to obtain disability insurance benefits under the Social Security Act. Under usual procedures the decision of the hearing examiner was administratively adopted and therefore stands as the final decision of the Secretary. This case pends on the defendant’s motion for summary judgment.

We shall find and determine that defendant’s motion must be denied for the reasons we shall state. In summary, we shall hold that the hearing held by the Secretary was controlled by the improper application of Section 404.1510 of the Regulations. Application of that regulation in a manner quite similar to the application of that and other regulations fully discussed in three cases recently decided by this Court requires that the decision of the Secretary be reversed. See Pollard v. Gardner, D.C., 267 F.Supp. 890, decided April 14, 1967, Underwood v. Gardner, D.C., 267 F.Supp. 802, decided May 4, 1967, and Homm v. Gardner, D.C., 267 F.Supp. 926, decided May 8, 1967.

I.

The hearing examiner stated the following facts, undisputed in the record, in regard to plaintiff and his relatively recent work record:

The claimant, Glenn D. Lee, testified that he was born on June 24,1910. This agrees with Exhibit No. 1, his application filed in the instant case; and Exhibit No. 2, his application for an account number. He testified that he was 56 years of age at the time of the hearing. The claimant completed the third grade in school and had no other education. He can barely read and write and cannot read the daily newspaper without spelling out the words. The claimant finished his schooling, the third grade, around the year 1919.
As to claimant’s work record, he testified in accordance with Exhibit No. 7, that from 1947 to March of 1964, he owned and operated an 80 acre farm on which he raised corn, cattle and hogs. Twenty of these acres were in cultivation and the rest in pasture. Claimant owned and operated a tractor, with which he tilled the twenty acres. He plowed, planted and did all the rest of the work on the twenty acres, and fed the cattle and hogs himself. The last year he was on the farm he had [580]*580some help during haying time, whom he hired to help pick up bales because his back was hurting him at the time. * # *
He has had no employment or self-employment and has done no work for wages or income of any kind since June 15, 1964.

From 1919 to 1937 plaintiff worked as a common laborer. He did carpentry work after 1937, joining that craft union in 1946. He worked on an assembly line during the second World War.

The hearing examiner’s description of plaintiff’s present activities is undisputed by any other evidence in the record. Indeed, it is corroborated by plaintiff’s wife [Tr. 55], and by a report of contact in August of 1965 [Tr. 100]. The hearing examiner’s description of those activities was as follows:

The claimant spends his time at home, sitting or lying around the house, and his wife does all the cooking and the housekeeping. Claimant complains of pain in his left hip and neck, and the pain he complained of in Exhibit No. 13, to Dr. Kirsch, begins about the middle of his back at about the level of his belt and goes down to his tail bone. He described it as being tender and burning and tingling. It also goes down through a hip and gives the same pain and burning sensation along the top and side of one leg, from his hip down to his knee. There is no differentiation in portions of the area of the leg down to the knee so affected, but the pain goes on a straight plane down the top and side, but not below the knee. Claimant testified that he also has some neck pain but not as much as he does in his back and hips and it really isn’t enough to bother about. It does not radiate any place but is present in the back where his head fastens on the “neck bone,” and is on the neck proper and on the right side. This pain occurs only after he has been lying in one position, but it goes away with activity, in from 30 minutes to an hour. The pain in his back and leg occurs when he stays in one position, and if he moves and gets, into a different position, either lying down or getting up or sitting up, it goes away, but then if he stays in that position for an hour or so, it starts hurting again and he has to change his position. In a standing position, the pain commences within ten or fifteen minutes, but he can stand it for an hour to an hour and a half, after which he must change his position.
His activities, at home,.include the fact that he tries to rake the yard but can stay at it only for a little while, about fifteen or twenty minutes, and then has to either lie down or sit down.. This causes pain in his back. He did re-shingle the small roof on his home, covering an area of “four squares.” He defined a square as an area three feet by three feet in dimension. It took him four days to do this, although he did complete the job. He did the work by sitting down on the roof. He stated that he could not stand or kneel. Claimant has a garden of about one hundred square feet. He hires the ground plowed, and he is able to hoe a little standing up. His wife does, the planting and picks the vegetables. when ready. He again repeated that his wife did all the housework and he just goes to bed or lies down or sits down or goes for a short walk. He-testified that he could walk about two blocks but if he tries to walk further than that he has to sit down and rest for a while because of back pain. He complained that any twisting motion of the back made his head and back feel as if they were trying to slip out of place. His appetite is good; helms lost no weight, but has maintained his present weight for about ten or fifteen years. He complained that he was only able to sleep about two hours at a time when he has to get up, go and' eat something and sit up a while and then go back to bed and start over again. He testified that he doesn’t get over four or five hours a night sleep. He has taken some pills but quit them because he woke before the pain pills “run out.” He didn’t know whether [581]*581these were pain pills or sleeping pills. He had taken aspirin but it didn’t do any good, so that currently he is under no medication. (Emphasis the hearing examiner’s.) [Tr. 8-9],

Before the hearing was held, the hearing examiner forwarded various medical reports of Dr. Peltier, one of defendant’s employed medical advisors. Dr. Peltier was then advised as follows:

You will be asked to testify at the hearing, as an expert medical witness, on the basis of the enclosed documents, as well as any additional documents and oral medical testimony that may be offered at the hearing. If you feel that further pre-hearing documentation is necessary (for the purpose of giving testimony as a medical advisor), please advise us immediately by mail. [Tr. 117].

Dr. Peltier was not asked to, nor did he in fact examine plaintiff. The limitations and restrictions placed upon Dr. Peltier and the hearing examiner’s intended exclusion from consideration of all medical evidence based on anything other than objective data was forecast by the hearing examiner’s explanation of what he expected to develop by Dr. Peltier’s testimony. In his letter to Dr. Peltier, the hearing examiner stated:

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Bluebook (online)
267 F. Supp. 578, 1967 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8336, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lee-v-gardner-mowd-1967.