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Satchip,

Public safety. The Court has already been convinced. The last I checked, this is the current and controling case for age discimination cases.

Mass. Board of Retirement v. Murgia 427 U.S. 327 (1976)

Facts of the Case:
Robert Murgia, although he was in excellent physical and mental health, was forced to retire at age fifty according to state law. Murgia had been a uniformed officer in the state police force. Murgia successfully challenged the mandatory retirement law in district court.

Question:
Did the Massachusetts law violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment?

Conclusion:
In a per curiam opinion, the Court held that the law did not violate the Equal Protection Clause. The Court found that the right of employment was not per se fundamental, and that uniformed state police officers over 50 did not constitute a suspect class under the Clause. Applying a rational relationship test, the Court reasoned that the statute was sufficiently justified as a means of protecting the public "by assuring physical preparedness of [the] uniformed police." The Court noted that while the law may not have been the best means to accomplish this purpose, it did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment merely because of its imperfections.

Last 4 Paragraphs of the Decision:

In this case, the Massachusetts statute clearly meets the requirements of the Equal Protection Clause, for the State's classification rationally furthers the purpose identified by the State: Through mandatory retirement at age 50, the legislature seeks to protect the public by assuring physical preparedness of its uniformed police.

Since physical ability generally declines with age, mandatory retirement at 50 serves to remove from police service those whose fitness for uniformed work presumptively has diminished with age. This clearly is rationally related to the State's objective. There is no indication that 26 (3) (a) has the effect of excluding from service so few officers who are in fact unqualified as to render age 50 a criterion wholly unrelated to the objective of the statute.

That the State chooses not to determine fitness more precisely through individualized testing after age 50 is not to say that the objective of assuring physical fitness is not rationally furthered by a maximum-age limitation. It is only to say that with regard to the interest of all concerned, the State perhaps has not chosen the best means to accomplish this purpose. But where rationality is the test, a State "does not violate the Equal Protection Clause merely because the classifications made by its laws are imperfect."

We do not make light of the substantial economic and psychological effects premature and compulsory retirement can have on an individual; nor do we denigrate the ability of elderly citizens to continue to contribute to society. The problems of retirement have been well documented and are beyond serious dispute. But "[w]e do not decide today that the [Massachusetts statute] is wise, that it best fulfills the relevant social and economic objectives that [Massachusetts] might ideally espouse, or that a more just and humane system could not be devised." We decide only that the system enacted by the Massachusetts Legislature does not deny appellee equal protection of the laws