Shelley v. Kraemer: the house on Labadie Avenue

J. D. and Ethel Lee Shelley moved from Mississippi to St. Louis with their children and in 1945 bought a house at 4600 Labadie Avenue. They did not know that in 1911 the property had been made subject to a covenant barring occupancy by anyone "not of the Caucasian race" for fifty years - a device attached to deeds across St. Louis and most other American cities.

Louis Kraemer, who owned property nearby, sued to void the sale and put the family out. The Missouri Supreme Court ordered exactly that. On appeal, on 3 May 1948, the United States Supreme Court held by six votes to none - three justices recused themselves, owning covenanted property - that although private parties may make such agreements, a state court that enforces one is engaged in state action, and the Fourteenth Amendment forbids it. The Shelleys kept their home.

The decision mattered enormously and solved very little on its own. Covenants stayed in deeds and kept their social force; the Federal Housing Administration went on refusing to insure mortgages in Black neighbourhoods for years afterwards; and private discrimination in sale and lending remained lawful until the Fair Housing Act of 1968. Racial covenant language still sits unenforceable in millions of American deeds, which several states now allow homeowners to formally strike out. The Shelley house is a National Historic Landmark.