LAKE PROVIDENCE, La. Early in her 18-year crusade to get federal disability checks for her entire family, Rosie Watson was examined by a skeptical doctor who wrote: "Patient is determined to become 'a ward of the government.' "
Determined she was.
Rosie Watson lost that particular skirmish but won the war, exploring each legal avenue until she got monthly checks from Social Security for herself, her common-law husband and all seven of her children.
Today, if you visit this bleak Mississippi River backwater on "check day," you're likely to see Ms. Watson at the post office picking up nine federal checks totaling $3,893 tax-free income that adds up to $46,716 by year's end. Few working families in the county earn more.
The story of Ms. Watson's success her single-minded pursuit of benefits and the government's on-again, off-again resistance shows how a once-modest federal program got out of control.
Originally aimed at providing life's necessities for poor adults too old, ill or disabled to work, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) now sends checks to many other groups, including children with hard-to-disprove mental ailments.
Congress, led by its new Republican majority, will begin hearings Friday aimed at cutting down to size this check-writing behemoth run by the Social Security Administration just outside Baltimore.
What's at stake for Rosie Watson is a livelihood.
She gets $343.50 a month in disability payments because she was found by a Social Security law judge to be too stressed out to work. Her common-law husband, L.C. Lyons, was awarded the same amount when a judge ruled that his 386 pounds made him too obese to work.
Their children, ages 13 to 22, lagged behind in school and scored poorly on psychological tests. Under government rules, this translated into a failure to demonstrate "age-appropriate behavior" and qualified them to get $458 each payments so widespread in Lake Providence and other communities around the nation that they are popularly known as "crazy checks."
A visitor to Rosie Watson's small bungalow would be hard-pressed to find any sign of high living.
The screen door hangs open. Soaps blare from the television. The living room overflows with worn furniture. The kitchen is caked with dirt. Roaches crawl the walls.
"I got nothing to hide," says Ms. Watson. Indeed, she and Mr. Lyons authorized Social Security to release her family's records to The Sun -- thousands of pages, a stack about a foot high -- which tell the story of her quest.
"It's done a lot for our family," she says. "The problem is, we're not able to work, and it's the best income."
There is little question about that.
Created by Congress two decades ago, the SSI program has become the nation's most generous welfare plan.
Its 6.3 million recipients include not only the aged, blind and injured, but also others more controversial: alcoholics and drug addicts who support their habits with the cash; immigrants; and 900,000 children, 61 percent of whom get checks for mental problems.
The cost of SSI more than doubled in the past five years. It is expected to increase another 55 percent by 1999.
Already it costs the federal government more than the original "welfare" program, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC).
To Sen. Robert C. Byrd, a West Virginia Democrat, it is a "well-intentioned entitlement program run amok."
Rosie Watson first tried to get aboard when she was 23.
She was an eighth-grade dropout with an infant and a toddler, collecting $90 a month in AFDC, when she heard about SSI shortly after it was launched in 1974. Realizing that the new disability plan paid better than traditional welfare, she filed her first application.
She was turned down, but she would persist over the years with 17 more applications for her family. With the rules permitting unlimited applications and unlimited SSI checks to a household, there is no indication that she did anything but exercise her right to seek benefits from a government program.
The long quest
First in the family to go on the SSI rolls was her second child, Sam. It was 1978 and he was 4 when Ms. Watson filed his application. He had just been declared "mild mentally retarded" by evaluators at Northeast Louisiana University. Ms. Watson had told them that he was violent, a threat to other children.
Relying on that report, Social Security decided in June that Sam should get benefits. But, a month later, a snag developed. Concerned that checks were being handed out too casually, the agency had begun to second-guess new awards. A pediatrician reviewing Sam's file said that his "problem" was normal childhood behavior. Social Security workers tossed Sam off the rolls.
Ms. Watson applied three more times unsuccessfully for Sam, then in 1981 gave up -- temporarily.
For 27 months, she made no claims. During that period Social Security underwent profound change, the result of the worst crisis in its history.
The agency had admitted in 1980 that 20 percent of disability recipients shouldn't be getting checks, prompting Congress and the Reagan administration to order a purge of the undeserving.
Social Security kicked hundreds of thousands of people off the rolls, generating a public outcry that forced Mr. Reagan to end the purge in 1984. Congress, the courts and Social Security reacted by opening up the rules, producing a sharp rise in the number of people entering the program -- including a tripling of the children's rolls between 1989 and 1994.
Determination to guard the public purse against cheaters gave way to concern about cheating the deserving poor.
Sam Watson was one of the first to benefit from this new attitude.
In February 1984, at the peak of the backlash, Ms. Watson filed his fifth application, again claiming that he was retarded and had behavior problems. "I have to keep knives or weapons away from him -- he has injured his brother," she said.
Sam was soon getting his checks.
Now 21, Sam still gets a check. Critics say there is little incentive for him to overcome his disability. His parents would lose the money if he does. And Social Security rarely checks to see if children are still disabled. The agency has not reviewed Sam's condition since awarding him benefits.
It is a pattern that conservatives see in many government entitlement programs -- benefits that encourage recipients to lead unproductive lives.
Not only did Sam become the first Watson to win benefits, he was the first to get a retroactive "bonus."
Because SSI payments are backdated to the date of application, no matter how long it takes Social Security to award benefits, each successful applicant gets a retroactive payment. In 1984, Sam's was nearly $900, covering the three months between application and approval.
Eight years later, Sam produced a much larger "bonus" for Ms. Watson. Social Security sent her nearly $10,000 after concluding that Sam really should have been put on the rolls in 1980. In 1993, Sam's brother Cary got a similar $10,000 payment. In all, the family has received $37,000 in tax-free retroactive payments.
Sam and Cary's checks grew out of a 1990 Supreme Court ruling known as the Zebley decision. Social Security was told to evaluate children as thoroughly as it does adults and ordered to reopen a half-million cases dating from 1980.
The result: The doors to disability payments were thrown open for children. So far, 134,000 of them, including Sam and Cary, have shared in retroactive payments of $1.4 billion.
By November 1991, six of Ms. Watson's seven children were on " the rolls.
Cary became the last, finally making it in February 1993.
Ms. Watson filed his first application in 1989 when he was 16. A psychologist found him "borderline ... easily irritated ... aggressive and explosive" and noted that he had killed a man in self-defense.
Caseworkers turned him down.
Ms. Watson applied again and got the same answer. This time she appealed to a judge.
Meanwhile, Cary went to prison for nearly two years for kicking his pregnant girlfriend, injuring her and the child, and his case was put on hold. Once freed, he went to a psychologist who told Social Security that he had an IQ of 53, "strong anti-social features in his personality and is volatile and explosive."
And, added Dr. Bobby L. Stephenson, of Monroe, La., "He said he does not want to work."
A month later, in February 1993, the judge awarded Cary monthly checks, and gave him the retroactive payment, excluding his jail time.
Eased access
Start to finish, Ms. Watson's quest for her children took 15 years. It spanned a period when Social Security and Congress eased access to benefits for a number of reasons; importantly for the Watson family they included expansion of the list of mental ailments that qualify. Today, mental problems are the primary diagnosis for almost two-thirds of the children among the 4.5 million disabled SSI recipients. Ms. Watson's offspring are among the two-thirds.
Only one of them, Oleaner, 13, baby of the family, still attends Southside Elementary School, across the street from the Watson house.
The principal at Southside is Willie Lee Bell, a man who despises the SSI program.
Broad-shouldered and soft-spoken, Mr. Bell knows poverty, too. He grew up with 10 brothers and sisters in a four-room sharecropper's house on Epps Plantation in West Carroll Parish, where his father worked 12 hours a day. His failed kidneys would automatically qualify him for disability payments from Social Security if he chose not to work.
He has watched the tidal wave of SSI applications up close. For each pupil who applies, he gets a questionnaire from Social Security, so he knows first-hand of the scramble for "crazy checks."
Mr. Bell says, "It is lowering the academic standards of this school."
Echoing complaints from other states, he and his staff say
children are encouraged by their parents -- some say coached -- to perform poorly and misbehave to get disability checks.
The children "don't want to fail," he says. "They are doing what mamma wants."
Social Security claims that coaching is not widespread, and federal investigators, thwarted by privacy laws, have been unable to document its dimensions.
As for Ms. Watson, she says that no such thing happened.
There is a single hint of it in the records, an allegation that George, now 14, wasn't trying "to the best of his ability" on a 1991 IQ test.
"I ain't never told any of 'em to act crazy and get some money," says Ms. Watson.
"Social Security will send you to their own doctor. They're not fooled because those doctors read your mind. They know what you can do and not do.
"I have people come up to me and say, 'Why are you getting all those 'crazy checks?'
"I say, 'You don't have to be crazy. It's a mental benefit. You can have some kind of sickness.'"
Uncertain statistics
Although "crazy checks" are an ingrained part of the culture and economy of this poor town, there is a question of how many young people really get the money.
Social Security checked a list of 515 pupils who attended Southside Elementary last year and said that 56 of them were getting SSI benefits, out of 116 who had ap-plied.
Mr. Bell, the principal, scoffs at those figures. He says that half the pupils have applied, including 120 in the past school year alone. And, he believes many are collecting checks.
At 44, Rosie Watson wears the years heavily. She was reared in this flat expanse of farm country, where jobs are few and the population is leaving.
She is polite and matter-of-fact as she talks with her visitor from her living room sofa in a house that lacks a telephone but has two police scanners -- "That's so I know what's going on."
"What's going on" includes violence and crime that make Lake Providence, with a population of 8,000, a microcosm of what is going on in many towns across America.
"I was born and raised here and this town has really gone down," Ms. Watson says.
When she was growing up, "it was nice," she said. "Now, it's
terrible. All the stuff going on now -- drugs and stuff, purse snatchings, stealing checks from the mail -- wasn't going on then. That's why I have a post office box."
As soon as she extracts the nine checks from that box, she cashes them. She gives the full amount to Sam, 21, and Cary, 22, the father of two children who has moved out of the house since being awarded benefits. The remaining funds are used for the other children and household expenses.
Most of the money goes for the children, to "see that they have what's needed," Ms. Watson says. "With what's left, I pay bills and buy food."
One "need" is $120 allowances for George, 14, David, 17, Willie, 18, and Danny, 19.
"Being the age they is and being out there with their little girlfriends, they need the money," she said.
Ms. Watson pulls a wad of bills and monthly payment books from her purse. Loans cost her more than $1,300. She says they include payments for various household purchases, furniture, washing machine and storm repairs.
There are bills for cable television, utilities and insurance policies. She spends $400 a month on food, which is supplemented by a backyard garden.
There is no requirement that the SSI money be spent to overcome a child's disability. Indeed, there is no requirement that a parent demonstrate that the disability requires added expenses.
Ms. Watson frankly says that she has none. One thing that probably makes that easier is the fact that each member of the Watson family on SSI automatically gets Medicaid for health care, a benefit that is potentially worth as much as the SSI payments.
The only expense she mentions for Oleaner is a $20-a-month allowance.
A shy, friendly child, Oleaner sits next to her mother on the sofa. She plays with a teddy bear, proudly shows off her boom box and occasionally sucks her thumb.
She goes to the kitchen and returns with a tin plate of canned meat and crackers. Settling onto another sofa in front of the television, she prays silently before eating lunch.
She is Ms. Watson's only daughter. Her mother, aware of the high teen pregnancy rate here, is protective, trying not to let her out of her sight.
While their presence on the SSI rolls is evidence that Ms. Watson has looked out for the well-being of her children, she also has had to work hard for herself.
Her pursuit of benefits took 11 years, longest in the family. She applied five times before finally convincing Social Security that she is disabled.
Her persistence is reflected in the shifting array of physical complaints she claimed. In 1974, it was high blood pressure, heart trouble and bad nerves that prevented her from working.
In 1975: anemia, dizziness, nerves and bad kidneys. In 1976: low blood pressure and heart problems.
In 1984 she blamed stomach problems, epilepsy and sinus trouble and the following year it was epilepsy again, along with fibroid tumors and "female problems."
A physician who examined her in 1974 wrote: "This patient's employability will be directly related to her motivation." Two years later, another doctor told Social Security that she wanted to be "a ward of the government."
After her third rejection in 1976, Ms. Watson put her own case aside for eight years while she pursued checks for the children. In 1984 and 1985 she applied for herself and failed. Both times, caseworkers said that she could work.
However, a psychiatrist, Dr. Jacob W. Storey, summed up her bleak situation in 1985: "This is a 34-year-old black female who has seven children under 12 years of age, an alcoholic husband and no money, who complains of insomnia, crying spells, depression."
The doctor reported that she has experienced hallucinations, has passed out when upset and has suffered some type of seizure disorder since she was 11.
After her fifth rejection, Ms. Watson decided for the first time to appeal her case to a Social Security judge rather than start anew. He sent her to another doctor who reported that she was "limited intellectually and most likely retarded ... has what appears to be a long-standing seizure disorder ... is either suffering from a chronic schizophrenia with depressed mood or from major depression.
"In any event," the doctor said, "these conditions combine to make it impossible for this lady to cope with the stresses of any type of competitive employment."
Two days before Christmas 1985, Ms. Watson received news she had waited a long time to hear.
A judge's ruling
The judge said she couldn't cope with the stress of work, blaming her problems on "her home life and the alcoholic husband, along with the lack of finances." But he said she should be able to work in the future and ordered Social Security to check on her in a year -- a task it took four years to get around to.
Two years later, Mr. Lyons got good news.
Despite testimony that suggested he could work, a judge awarded the former logger and carpenter benefits because he weighed 386 pounds.
A separate, unstated issue was whether work was available for Mr. Lyons -- or anybody else -- in East Carroll Parish, where cotton was once king. Machines have replaced field hands -- and new jobs have not replaced the back-breaking labor in the cotton fields.
With 57 percent of its residents living below the federal poverty level, only a third of them holding jobs and another third less than 16 years old, East Carroll Parish is ripe for SSI. Ten percent of its residents are on SSI, compared with 2.4 percent across the United States generally. Their checks bring $4 million a year to this community.
The high rate is common in Louisiana, which has the seventh largest number of children on SSI rolls in the United States -- 36,000 at the end of 1993 -- despite its relatively small population. Maryland, for example, was 25th, with 9,000 children getting benefits.
As she sits in her living room, Ms. Watson appears in sharp contrast with the woman who emerges from her records. At times in conversation she is combative, able to recall intricate details of the family's two-decade quest for SSI, occasionally critical of people who have "copped an attitude" toward her.
She recalls a dispute last year with a junior high school principal that began when her son George's books were stolen from his locker. The principal insisted that she replace them, but she refused, saying that it was the school's responsibility because George had left them where he was told to. Neither she nor the principal gave in, she says, and George finished the year without books.
"He got F's and will be in the seventh grade again," said Ms. Watson, seemingly proud of the stand she took.
The thick Social Security file portrays a different woman, seemingly incapable of any activity, physical or mental.
In the past 10 years she has told caseworkers and doctors that she "doesn't know what country we live in," that her "ability to recall is almost void," that she can't handle money or count, that she needs help cooking because she forgets what she's doing and that "whenever I get up to do anything, I pass out and must have someone with me at all times."
The history of SSI suggests that the Watson family will remain on SSI permanently, with the children eventually moving to the adult rolls, as have nearly 300,000 adults who got their first SSI checks as children.
It is a pattern that troubles defenders and critics of the program alike.
Critics say that giving no-strings-attached cash to the parents discourages them and the children from trying to overcome the disability.
June Gibbs Brown, chief investigator in the Department of Health and Human Ser-vices, wrote last October:
"If Congress intended that the SSI program provide only cash assistance to children with mental impairments, then the program is successful."
But, she added, "If Congress intended that the SSI program should help children overcome their disabilities and grow into adults capable of engaging in substantial gainful activity, changes are needed."
Shirley S. Chater, the Social Security commissioner, acknowledges that she is concerned when children are labeled as being disabled.
That "could be a self-fulfilling prophecy," she said.
"We know that if a child comes on the disability rolls, they tend to stay on for a very, very long period of time."
Adds Mike Baumann, who makes disability decisions in Shreveport, La., where the Watson cases were decided: "The kids are being told that their worth is in sucking off the government teat, that their worth is in not achieving."
Ms. Watson views the issue in more practical terms. Where critics see high incomes for people who do nothing for the money, Ms. Watson sees only a stack of bills and a big family to feed.
"I think it's a good program," she says.