The Flemming Rule of 1960 was named after Arthur Flemming, who at the time was the head of United States' Department of Health and Human Services. The Flemming rule was an administrative ruling which decreed that U.S. states could not deny income assistance eligibility through the U.S. Aid to Families with Dependent Children program on the basis of a home being considered unsuitable per the woman's children being termed as illegitimate, a term for the status of a child born to parents who are unmarried to one another.