Which Massachusetts Benefit Uses Which Test

Massachusetts has two general definitions of veteran. Since August 2024 they have been materially different, and almost every mistake a Massachusetts veteran makes about their own eligibility comes from applying one where the other governs. The broad one, in G.L. c. 115, s. 1, as replaced by section 48 of the HERO Act. A veteran is any person who is a veteran under clause Forty-third; or served on active duty in the armed forces for at least 90 days with a last discharge or release under conditions other than dishonorable; or served on active duty, including active duty solely for training, and was awarded a service-connected disability or died in such service under conditions other than dishonorable; or served in the National Guard or as a reservist in any branch, including active duty solely for training, and was awarded a service-connected disability or died in such service; or is determined to be a veteran according to VA. In any case the service must have been entered into or served in Massachusetts, or the person must have resided in the commonwealth for one day, except when determining the residential eligibility of a deceased veteran's dependents. Five routes, and the fifth swallows a great deal: if VA treats you as a veteran, chapter 115 treats you as one. The second route drops the wartime requirement entirely. The third and fourth expressly count active duty for training where a service-connected disability or a death resulted, which reaches a recruit injured in basic training and a Guard member injured at annual training. The narrow one, in G.L. c. 4, s. 7, clause Forty-third, which the HERO Act did not touch. A veteran is a person whose last discharge or release from wartime service was under honorable conditions and who served at least 90 days of active service with at least one day of wartime service; or a member of the American Merchant Marine who served in armed conflict between December 7, 1941 and December 31, 1946 with an honorable discharge from the Coast Guard, Army or Navy; or a person whose last discharge from active service was under honorable conditions and who served at least 180 days of active service, with no wartime requirement. A person who served in wartime and was awarded a service-connected disability or a Purple Heart, or who died in service under conditions other than dishonorable, is a veteran without completing 90 days; the 180-day route has an equivalent relief for a service-connected disability or a death in service. And clause Forty-third closes a door the chapter 115 definition opens: active service in the armed forces, as used in that clause, shall not include active duty for training in the Army or Air National Guard or active duty for training as a reservist. A Guard member whose only service was training duty is not a veteran under clause Forty-third at all. Which definition runs which benefit. Chapter 115 benefits and the soldiers' homes use the broad one, because chapter 115A section 1 points at chapter 115 section 1. Everything else in this file that names a definition names clause Forty-third: the clause Twenty-second property tax series, the section 5N work-off programme, the civil service preference in chapter 31, the motor vehicle excise exemption, the VETERAN and decoration licence plates, and the academic credit provision in chapter 15A section 42. So a veteran with two years of peacetime service in the 1980s and no rating is a veteran for chapter 115 benefits and for admission to a soldiers' home, and is a veteran under the 180-day route of clause Forty-third for the property tax and the civil service preference. A Guard member with six years of drills and annual training and no active duty tour is a veteran for chapter 115 only if they hold a service-connected disability, and is not a veteran under clause Forty-third for anything. The wartime periods, which decide the 90-day route and the civil service disabled veteran tier. Clause Forty-third names the Spanish War from February 15, 1898 to July 4, 1902; World War I; World War II from September 16, 1940 to July 25, 1947 with a Victory Medal; the Korean War from June 25, 1950 to January 31, 1955, plus anyone awarded the Korea Defense Service Medal; Vietnam from August 5, 1964 to May 7, 1975, or 180 days of active service between February 1, 1955 and August 4, 1964; the Lebanese peace keeping force with a campaign medal from August 25, 1982 until the withdrawal; the Grenada rescue mission with a campaign medal from October 25 to December 15, 1983; the Panamanian intervention force with a campaign medal from December 20, 1989 to January 31, 1990; and the Persian Gulf from August 2, 1990. The WAAC counts, and any woman discharged from a corps established to enable women to serve with or as auxiliary to the armed forces is deemed a veteran. Two features of that list are worth pulling out. The Persian Gulf period has no end date and is unusually hard to end. It runs from August 2, 1990 to a date to be determined by presidential proclamation or executive order and concurrent resolution of the Congress. Both are required. No such proclamation and resolution have issued, so every person who has served on active duty since August 1990 is in a wartime period for Massachusetts purposes, and the wartime requirement in the 90-day route is satisfied for the entire post-Cold-War cohort. This is the opposite of the position in several states in this catalog where an agency has printed an administrative end date. The same definition means different things in different chapters, and the statute says so on its face. World War II means service with a Victory Medal between September 16, 1940 and July 25, 1947, "except that for the purposes of chapter 31 it shall mean all active service between the dates of September 16, 1940 and June 25, 1950". Vietnam, for chapter 31 purposes, also includes all active service between May 7, 1975 and June 4, 1976. So a veteran can be a wartime veteran for the civil service preference and not for the property tax abatement, on identical facts. The exclusions in clause Forty-third. None of the following is a veteran: a person who declared an intention to become a citizen and withdrew it under the act of Congress approved July 9, 1918; a person discharged on their own application or solicitation by reason of being an enemy alien; a person proved guilty of wilful desertion; a person whose only service was as a member of the Coast Guard Auxiliary or as a temporary member of the Coast Guard Reserve, or both; and a person whose last discharge or release is dishonorable. Note that the general bar is a dishonorable discharge specifically. A general discharge under honorable conditions satisfies "under honorable conditions" and satisfies "other than dishonorable", so it does not exclude a veteran from clause Forty-third or from chapter 115. Two provisions in this file do ask for something narrower and both are outside the definition sections: the prisoner of war licence plate requires an honorable characterisation, and the burial duty in chapter 115 section 7 excludes a person designated on discharge as a conscientious objector. Three narrower definitions exist for particular purposes and should not be read across. Disabled veteran for the civil service preference, in G.L. c. 31, s. 1, requires a continuing service-incurred disability of at least ten per cent based on wartime service with VA compensation, or a permanent physical disability carrying a branch retirement allowance, or a statutory award based on wartime service. A peacetime-incurred ten per cent rating does not reach the top tier of the eligible list. Qualified veteran for the hiring tax credit is the federal Work Opportunity Tax Credit definition in section 51(d)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and has nothing to do with Massachusetts law. And the two property tax clauses that reach total disability use neither of the general definitions for the disability element. Clause Twenty-second E asks for a rating of one hundred per cent as determined by VA, and clause Twenty-second F asks for paraplegia or one hundred per cent service-connected blindness. Neither names individual unemployability, although the motor vehicle excise statute and the registration fee waiver both do, in words the 2024 HERO Act added. That asymmetry is the sharpest open question in the Massachusetts file. One more thing a discharge characterisation does not settle. Section 16 of chapter 115 lets a veteran with an other than honorable discharge attributable to sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression, to discrimination on several other grounds, or to any VA discharge-upgrade category including military sexual trauma, traumatic brain injury and mental health conditions, obtain state-based benefits without the federal record being corrected first. A veteran holding a bad paper discharge should read that entry before concluding that any of this file is closed to them. The practical advice, as everywhere in this catalog, is to take the discharge document and any rating decision to the veterans' agent for the city or town where you live. That officer is free, must be certified and retrained under chapter 115 section 3B, is bound to keep what you tell them in confidence under section 3B(f), and is the only person in Massachusetts whose job is to hold all of these definitions at once.