Hugo Black

“ I would have little, if any, objection to the majority's decision in this case if it were written as the report of the House Committee on Education and Labor, but, as an opinion ostensibly resting on the language of the Constitution, I find it woefully deficient. Once the verbiage is pared away, it is obvious that this Court today adopts the views of the District Court "that to cut off a welfare recipient in the face of . . . ‘brutal need' without a prior [p276] hearing of some sort is unconscionable," and therefore, says the Court, unconstitutional. ”

“ After all, at each step, as the majority seems to feel, the issue is only one of weighing the government's pocketbook against the actual survival of the recipient, and surely that balance must always tip in favor of the individual. Similarly today's decision requires only the opportunity to have the benefit of counsel at the administrative hearing, but it is difficult to believe that the same reasoning process would not require the appointment of counsel, for otherwise the right to counsel is a meaningless one, since these [p279] people are too poor to hire their own advocates. ”

“ It somewhat strains credulity to say that the government's promise of charity to an individual is property belonging to that individual when the government denies that the individual is honestly entitled to receive such a payment. ”

“ I am aware that some feel that the process employed in reaching today's decision is not dependent on the individual views of the Justices involved, but is a mere objective search for the "collective conscience of mankind;" but, in my view, that description is only a euphemism for an individual's judgment. Judges are as human as anyone, and as likely as others to see the world through their own eyes and find the "collective conscience" remarkably similar to their own. ”

“ It was largely to escape just such pressing economic problems and attendant government repression that people from Europe, Asia, and other areas settled this country and formed our Nation. Many of those settlers had personally suffered from persecutions of various kinds, and wanted to get away from governments that had unrestrained powers to make life miserable for their citizens. ”

“ The names are there because state welfare officials believed that those people were eligible for assistance. Probably, in the officials' haste to make out the lists, many names were put there erroneously in order to alleviate immediate suffering, and undoubtedly some people are drawing relief who are not entitled under the law to do so. Doubtless some draw relief checks from time to time who know they are not eligible, either because they are not actually in need or for some other reason. ”

“ While this Court will perhaps have insured that no needy person will be taken off the rolls without a full "due process" proceeding, it will also have insured that many will never get on the rolls, or at least that they will remain destitute during the lengthy proceedings followed to determine initial eligibility. ”