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Zablocki v. Redhail, 434 U.S. 374 (1978)

CASE: Man denied a marriage license because of a state law forbidding men with minor children to support from getting married without special permission from the court.

FACTS: Redhail was as Wisconsin resident ordered to pay child support for his illegitimate daughter born while he was in high school. He quickly fell behind on the payments of $109 per month. Two years later, he filed an application for a marriage license with Zablocki, the County Clerk of Milwaukee County, and was denied on the grounds that he had a child to support and had not received permission from a court to get married. The Wisconsin law provides that "any Wisconsin resident having minor issue not in his custody and which he is under an obligation to support by any court order or judgment" may not wed without first obtaining a court order granting permission to marry. Court permission cannot be granted unless the marriage applicant submits proof of compliance with the support obligation and, in addition, demonstrates that the children covered by the support order "are not then and are not likely to thereafter to become public charges." He stipulated that he would have failed to meet both prongs, as he was behind in his payments and that, even with his payments, the child would still have to rely on public assistance. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin struck down the law as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause; Zablocki made a direct appeal to the Supes arguing that the D.C. erred; Redhail defended the ruling and also argued that the law did not satisfy the requirements of substantive due process.

REDHAIL ARGUES: The law deprived him of his right to liberty (privacy) without due process of law and of his right to equal protection of the law

STATE ARGUES: The law is necessary to the acomplishment of the permissible (compelling) state interests of "preserving the racial integrity of its citizens" and to prevent "the corruption of blood," "a mongrel breed of citizens," and "the obliteration of racial pride." Also, the state argued that regulation of marriage was traditionally a state function except from federal legislation or control and that the regulation of marriage should be left to exclusive state control under the Tenth Amendment.

OPINION OF THE COURT: State deprived man with an illegitimate child whom he was obligated to support of his right to equal protection of the law when it required him to receive a court order in order to marry.

RATIONALE:

  • Such a classification must survive strict scrutiny.
  • The right to marry is a fundamental right stemming from the right to privacy (liberty) under the Fourteenth Amendment.
  • If the right of a woman to abort a fetus is considered a fundamental right, then surely the right to choose to marry and raise the child in a traditional family setting must receive equivalent protection.
  • The statute significantly interferes with a fundamental right (right to marry).
  • State's interestes in furnishing those in Redhail's position with an opportunity to be counseled as to the necessity of fulfilling his other obligations and protecting the welfare of out-of-wedlock children are legitimate and substantial, but less intrusive ways of achieving these ends are available to the state.
  • There are other, more effective ways for the state to collect from deadbeat parents.
  • State interest in counselling applicants cannot support the withholding of court permission to marry once the counselling is completed.
  • Classification is overinclusive in that it fails to take into account a situation in which the applicant's financial situation will actually improve with marriage. Preventing them from being able to get married might actually injure those (children) it was meant to protect by guaranteeing that the support obligations will never be met. The net result might be more illegitimate children.

CONCURRING OPINIONS:

    Stewart wrote:

    • DUE PROCESS: This is not an equal protection clause case. To say that the statute creates classifications in the equal protection sense struck him as "nothing short of fantasy." "The problem in this case is not one of discriminatory classifications, but of unwarranted encroachment upon a constitutionally protected freedom. I think that the Wisconsin statute is unconstitutional because it exceeds the bounds of permissible state regulation of marriage, and invades the sphere of liberty protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment." This case is one of substantial due process by another name. This bait-and-switch only serves to misdirect a confused doctrine. The majority should call a spade a spade and just say that the law violates substantive due process.
    • RIGHT TO MARRY: There is no right to marry, as evidenced by the fact that the states can significantly limit or, in some cases, entirely prohibit couples from getting married. Even so, there are some limits to state interference.

    Powell wrote:

    • STANDARD OF JUDICIAL SCRUTINY DEPRIVES THE STATES: The majority's opinion sweeps too broadly in requiring that any regulation that "directly and substantially" interferes with the decision to marry be subjected to the strict-scrutiny test. "A 'compelling state purpose' inquiry would cast doubt on the network of restrictions that the States have fashioned to govern marriage and divorce."

    Stevens wrote:

    • This case can be distinguished from Califano v. Jobst, 434 U.S. 47 (1977), in that Jobst dealt with a classification based on marital status whereas this one deals with a classification based on the right of whether to enter into marriage. "The individual's interest in making the marriage decision independently is sufficiently important to merit special constitutional protection."
    • The law has perverse outcomes in that it keeps from poor from getting married, applies "to childless couples, couples who will have illegitimate children if they are forbidden to marry, couples whose economic status will be improved by marriage, and couples who are so poor that the marriage will have no impact on the welfare status of their children in any event. Even assuming that the right to marry may sometimes be denied on economic grounds, this clumsy and deliberate legislative discrimination between the rich and the poor is irrational in so many ways that it cannot withstand scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.


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