in 1945 the Kramer's put their home in
st. Louis Missouri up for sale the home
attracted many prospective buyers
including JD and Ethel Shelley an
african-american couple all the
Shelley's wanted was to buy a home but
instead they became part of a legal
battle that would determine the fate of
many American neighborhoods the
Shelley's made an offer on the home and
the Kramer's accepted unbeknownst to the
Shelley's however a restrictive covenant
was in place that barred the lease or
sale of homes in the neighborhood to
anyone quote of the Negro or Mongolian
race unquote the Marcus Avenue
Improvement Association a local
homeowners association brought suit in
the Circuit Court of the city of st.
Louis seeking to enforce the Covenant
they asked the court to enjoin the
Shelley's from taking possession of the
property and to divest them of ownership
the trial court ruled that the Covenant
was unenforceable in a non bank decision
the Supreme Court of Missouri reversed
ruling that the Covenant didn't deprive
the Shelley's of any rights guaranteed
by the Equal Protection Clause of the
Fourteenth Amendment the court directed
the circuit court to enforce the
Covenant and divest the Shelley's who
had already moved into the house of
ownership the United States Supreme
Court granted cert at the time the court
heard oral argument racially restrictive
covenants had become so widespread that
three justices were forced to recuse
themselves because they had discovered
their own properties were subject to the
same type of covenant at issue in this
case the issue before the court was
whether the Constitution prohibits the
judicial enforcement of racially
restrictive land use covenants that are
entered into by private parties in a
unanimous decision authored by Chief
Justice Vinson the court held that the
enforcement of racially restrictive
covenants by a state institution
violates the Equal Protection Clause of
the Fourteenth Amendment the attorney
for the Shelley's was Thurgood Marshall
the future United States Supreme Court
justice he argued that the judicial
enforcement of racially restrictive land
use covenants denied the Shelley's three
rights guaranteed under the Fourteenth
Amendment equal protection of the law
before depriving them of property and
the privileges and immunities guaranteed
to all citizens of the United States
from the outset the court noted that the
Fourteenth Amendment applies only to
state action thus a restrictive covenant
entered into by private parties no
matter how vile couldn't by itself
violate the Fourteenth Amendment the
court reasoned however that extensive
Authority existed supporting the
proposition that judicial enforcement of
a private agreement constitutes state
action for purposes of the Fourteenth
Amendment as a result the Court
determined that enforcing the racially
restrictive covenant by the state courts
constituted state action quote in the
full and complete sense of the phrase
unquote without judicial assistance the
restrictive covenant could have been
willingly observed by buyers and sellers
without any constitutional issue but the
state couldn't use the coercive power of
the judiciary to enforce racial
restrictions imposed by private
agreements this according to the court
is a form of state action the court
reasoned that enforcing racist
agreements would contravene the 14th
Amendment's fundamental purpose to
establish equal rights among all
citizens and to prevent discrimination
on the basis of race because the
enforcement of the Covenant by state
courts had so clearly violated the Equal
Protection Clause the court found it
unnecessary to reach the claims based on
the Due Process Clause and the
privileges and immunities clause Shelley
was a dramatic moment in the shaping of
American neighborhoods by disabling the
courts from enforcing racial covenants
the Supreme Court set the stage for
integration in communities across the
nation