Shelley v. Kraemer

Shelley v. Kraemer
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued January 15, 1948 Decided May 3, 1948
Full case name	Shelley et ux. v. Kraemer et ux. McGhee et ux. v. Sipes et al.
Citations	334 U.S. 1 (more) 334 U.S. 1 (1948); 68 S. Ct. 836; 92 L. Ed. 1161; 3 A.L.R.2d 441
Prior history	Judgment for defendants; reversed, 198 S.W.2d 679 (Mo. 1947); certiorari granted. Judgment for plaintiffs; affirmed 25 N.W.2d 638 (Mich. 614); certiorari granted.
Holding
The Fourteenth Amendment prohibits a state from enforcing restrictive covenants that would prohibit a person from owning or occupying property based on race or color.
Court membership
Case opinions
Majority	Vinson, joined by Black, Frankfurter, Douglas, Murphy, Burton
Reed, Jackson, Rutledge took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. XIV

Shelley v. Kraemer, 334 US 1 (1948) is a landmarkUnited States Supreme Court case which held that courts could not enforce racial covenants on real estate.

In 1945, an African-American family by the name of Shelley purchased a house in St. Louis, Missouri. At the time of purchase, they were unaware that a restrictive covenant had been in place on the property since 1911. The restrictive covenant prevented "people of the Negro or Mongolian Race" from occupying the property. Louis Kraemer, who lived ten blocks away, sued to prevent the Shelleys from gaining possession of the property. The Supreme Court of Missouri held that the covenant was enforceable against the purchasers because the covenant was a purely private agreement between the original parties thereto. As such, it "ran with the land" and was enforceable against subsequent owners. Moreover, since it ran in favor of an estate rather than merely a person, it could be enforced against a third party. A materially similar scenario occurred in the companion case McGhee v. Sipes from Detroit, Michigan, where the McGhees purchased land that was subject to a similar restrictive covenant. The Supreme Court consolidated both cases for oral arguments and considered two questions: are racially based restrictive covenants legal under the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution, and can they be enforced by a court of law?

The United States Supreme Court held "the restrictive racially-based restrictive covenants are not, on their face, invalid under the Fourteenth Amendment." However, while private parties may voluntarily abide by the terms of such a restrictive covenant, they may not seek judicial enforcement of such a covenant because enforcement by the courts would constitute state action. Since such state action would necessarily be discriminatory, the enforcement of a racially based restrictive covenant in a state court would violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The court rejected the argument that since state courts would enforce a restrictive covenant against white people, judicial enforcement of restrictive covenants would not violate the Equal Protection Clause. The court noted that the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees individual rights, and that equal protection of the law is not achieved through the imposition of inequalities.