C was born on August 20th, 1955. Her natural mother lived in the same building as X and his wife. After C’s birth, the natural mother gave the child to X and his wife to raise while she sought employment. She told X and his wife that they could have custody of the child for as long as they wished and could even adopt the child. X and his wife raised the child and instituted adoption proceedings in Pennsylvania but abandoned the adoption.

X applied for and became entitled to old age social security insurance benefits in August 1961. At the same time, he applied for child’s insurance benefits for C as his adopted child.

Social Security law provided that the requirements for child’s insurance benefits are met if C was X’s child as defined in the social security act. In making this determination, social security looked to the law of the state in which the insured individual was domiciled at the time of their application for benefits, in this case, Pennsylvania.

If under state law C qualified to inherit personal property from X under the laws of intestate devolution, then she was considered to be X’s child for purposes of receiving social security child’s benefits.

Under Pennsylvania law, C could inherit from X if X had been given permanent custody of the child in exchange for a promise to adopt the child and give the child inheritance rights, even if he had failed to do so.

In the instant case, however, X had not made any promise to adopt C.

Sadly, therefore, C was not considered X’s child under the Social Security Act, and benefits were denied.
See Social Security Ruling (SSR) 64-27.

This material should not be construed as legal advice for any particular fact situation, but is intended for general informational purposes only. For advice specific to any individual situation, an experienced attorney should be contacted.