Law Commons^™

A Step Too Far - Posthumously Conceived Children And Social Security Entitlements In Vernoff V Astrue, Mel Cousins

Mel Cousins

This case note examines a recent decision of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit concerning the entitlements of posthumously conceived children under social security. In contrast to its earlier (expansionary) decision in Gillett-Netting, here the Court set out the limits to how far it is willing to push the interpretation of the (convoluted) legislation and refused to find a right to benefit where there was no evidence that the father had consented to (or even considered) having a child post-mortem.