Dead Men Reproducing: Responding to the Existence of Afterdeath Children

Browne C. Lewis
August 25, 2008

Medical advances currently available permit dead men to reproduce. Sperm can be successfully stored for at least ten years. Therefore, a man’s heirs may be created years after his death. Recently, this event has gone from a possibility to a reality. More and more women are choosing to conceive children using the sperm of their dead husbands or boy friends.

Widows of soldiers killed in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have conceived children through artificial insemination using their dead husbands’ sperm. The process of creating afterdeath children can occur in two contexts. Scenario One - Prior to going to war, the man has his sperm extracted and placed in a sperm bank. If the man does not return from the war, his wife or girl friend uses his stored sperm to create his child. Scenario Two - The man is killed in the war. His wife or girl friend has the doctor harvest sperm from his dead body. Then, she uses that sperm to conceive his child. Either scenario results in the existence of an afterdeath child that needs financial support.

The law has not kept pace with the reproductive technology. Hence, when the mothers of the posthumously conceived children file social security surviving children claims on behalf of their children, the claims are often rejected. The children are denied benefits because the agency is not equipped to deal with “survivors” who did not exist at the time that the insured worker died. The resolution of these Social Security cases often turns on the manner in which the children are classified under the states’ intestacy systems. If the child is eligible to inherit under the intestacy system, the child is entitled to social security survivor’s benefits. the rest

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