preliminary injunction against state regulations denying pre-termination or reduction hearings in cases involving only issues of policy found to have been erroneously applied to cases involving individual questions of fact or judgment
How later courts described this case
- preliminary injunction against state regulations denying pre-termination or reduction hearings in cases involving only issues of policy found to have been erroneously applied to cases involving individual questions of fact or judgment
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
HAMLIN, Circuit Judge
(concurring and dissenting):
I respectfully dissent from that portion of the majority order which grants broad injunctive relief against defendant Carleson. The majority objects to the challenged regulations because of errors committed by welfare administrators in determining whether a fair hearing request raises issues of fact or policy. While it might be that the regulations in question do not guarantee that no mistakes will be made, they are designed to, and reasonably do, provide aid pending fair hearings where factual matters are in dispute. This seems to be all that is required by Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U.S. 254 , 90 S.Ct. 1153 , 25 L.Ed.2d 491 (1970).
Defendant’s affidavits controvert the implication that the present system produces an excessive number of inequities and indicate that errors have been kept to a very small percentage. 1 Certainly errors are inherent in any very large scale administrative undertaking and I would expect that the defendant would use every effort to reduce even the small percentage now existing.
As Judge Learned Hand has stated, “ . . . due process of law does not mean infallible process of law.” Schechtman v. Foster, 172 F.2d 339, 341 (2nd Cir. 1949).
The record is devoid of any evidence of lack of good faith in the administration of the regulations.
As indicated above, I would not grant the sought-for injunction.
. From the thousands of fair bearing requests filed monthly (4,090 requests were filed in October, 1972, alone) plaintiffs have submitted a list of 49 cases where welfare recipients have allegedly been erroneously denied aid pending a hearing. Plaintiffs’ Supplemental Memorandum, September 21, 1972. But only five such cases involve errors in administering the fact-policy distinction. Defendant’s Sup-, plemental Memorandum, September 28, 1972.