Respondents sought a declaration that the statute was invalid under U.S. Constitution amendments I and XIV, injunctive relief, and damages for lost earnings.

The Court looked to the substantially of the state's interest in enforcing the statute and to the narrowness of the limits within which the discrimination was confined.

Four federally registered resident aliens, having been discharged from their competitive civil service positions with the City of New York because of the provisions of 53 of the New York Civil Service Law barring any person from the competitive class "unless he is a citizen of the United States," sued for declaratory and injunctive relief against enforcement of the statute.

Dougall, Esperanza Jorge, Teresa Vargas, and Sylvia Castro, are federally registered resident aliens.

Because of their alienage, they were discharged in 1971 from their competitive civil service positions with the city of New York Prior to December 28, 1970, the respondents were employed by nonprofit organizations that received funds through HRA from the United States Office of Economic Opportunity.

These supportive funds ceased to be available about that time and the organizations, with approximately 450 employees, including the respondents and 16 other non-citizens, were absorbed by the Manpower Career and Development Agency (MCDA) of HRA.

(Section 45 of the New York Civil Service Law, applicable to employees of a private institution acquired by the State or a public agency, contains a restriction, similar to that in § 53 (1), against the employment of an alien in a position classified in the competitive class.)

(The appellants in their answer alleged that respondent Castro was terminated for the additional reason that she lacked sufficient experience to qualify for the position of senior human resources technician.

That court ruled that the statute was violative of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Supremacy Clause, and granted injunctive relief.

In reaching its conclusion that § 53 was unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment, it placed primary reliance on the Supreme Court's decisions in Graham v. Richardson, 403 U.S. 365 (1971), and Takahashi v. Fish Comm'n, 334 U.S. 410 (1948), and, to an extent, on Purdy & Fitzpatrick v. State, 71 Cal.

On the basis of these cases, the court also concluded that § 53 was in conflict with Congress' comprehensive regulation of immigration and naturalization because, in effect, it denied respondents entrance to, and abode in, New York.

The Court looked to the substantiality of the state's interest in enforcing the statute and to the narrowness of the limits within which the discrimination was confined.

Section 53 violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment since, in the context of New York's statutory civil service scheme, it sweeps indiscriminately and is not narrowly limited to the accomplishment of substantial state interests.

Nor can the citizenship requirement be justified on the unproved premise that aliens are less permanent employees than citizens, or on other grounds asserted by appellants.