Veterans’ Benefit Limitations Upheld : Plea of Ex-Servicemen Who Came From Other States Is Denied

A state law limiting educational, home loan and other financial benefits only to those ex-servicemen who were living in the state at the time they enlisted was upheld Wednesday by a Los Angeles Superior Court judge.

In a ruling that could affect thousands of veterans living in California, Judge Barnet Cooperman said such payments are merely supplemental to federal benefits.

Immediately after the decision, lawyers representing those veterans excluded from the Cal-Vet program vowed to appeal.

Creating Two Classes

“As counsel, I’m extremely disappointed,” said attorney Dan Stormer, who filed a class-action lawsuit in May, along with the Western Law Center for the Handicapped at Loyola Law School. “As a veteran, I’m mildly insulted that we who served this country can be denied benefits, simply because we did not live in the state at the time we entered the service.

“This certainly creates two classes of veterans.”

At least 800,000 of the state’s 3.3 million veterans were not California residents when they began active duty and, as a consequence, may have been excluded from millions of dollars in benefits, Stormer had argued.

He and other attorneys contended that limiting benefits was unlawful, because it violated the U.S. Constitution’s guarantees of equal protection and freedom of travel.

They based their court challenge on a 1986 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that outlawed a New York statute giving job preference to veterans with such “fixed-point” residency status.

Judge’s Viewpoint

But Cooperman took a different view, ruling that the California case did not fall under the high court’s ruling. Moreover, Cooperman said, limiting certain state benefits to only those veterans who lived in California at the time of military enlistment was not discriminatory.

The judge said the benefits in question--ranging from low-interest home and farm loans to disaster indemnity benefits and tuition stipends to dependents of disabled veterans--are simply supplements to the “generous” benefits offered by the federal government.

“Veterans have studied here, bought businesses here, bought homes here, have prospered here as the federal law contemplated,” Cooperman said. “It is fair to say the state of California became the goal of thousands and probably hundreds of thousands of veterans who were able to freely travel to this state because of those generous (G.I. Bill and other federal) benefits.”

In addition, some benefits offered by the state--including admission to the California Veterans Home and fee waivers at state colleges and universities for dependents of ex-servicemen--usually are available to all veterans, even those who did not reside in California when they enlisted.

“This court does not believe it can be said that veterans who wish to leave their homes and come to California . . . suffer,” the judge said.

The lead plaintiffs in the class-action suit, Korean War veteran Charles Del Monte, 59, of Los Angeles, and his family, had claimed they were wrongly denied educational stipends for their sons--both of whom were born in California. Del Monte, who lived in New York when he enlisted in the Army in 1950, moved to California in 1963.