Notes & Comments

The Akron Fair Housing Case
Tom Powell
State University of New York, Emeritus

Editor's Note:

In January of 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court heard a case in which the Buckeye Community Hope Foundation, a builder of low-income housing, sued the city of Cuyahoga Falls for delaying construction of a housing project-an action they claimed was motivated in part by issues of discrimination. Although three months later the court overturned a lower court ruling and found in favor of the city,(1) the case illustrates the continuation of long-standing divisions concerning race and residence in this Northeast Ohio Community.

Nearly forty years before the recent Supreme Court decision, Cuyahoga Falls was the focus of another lawsuit over discrimination and housing: Mercer Brancher et al. v. The Akron Area Board of Realtors et al., also known as "The Akron Fair Housing Case." Thomas Powell, a former University of Akron professor and resident of Cuyahoga Falls at the time, here presents a first-hand account of his family's role in the development of this case. Powell has chosen to write his account in the first person, present tense in order to impart the sense of "bite" and immediacy he felt as an eyewitness to these events. Given recent events, his stylistic choice seems particularly appropriate-even after forty years, some of the basic issues he discusses still have currency today.

Kevin Kern

###

1964: The new Civil Rights Act at last applies a crucial distinction between personal property and privately owned property whose use is not personal: a principle based in English common law and enunciated clearly in Munn v. Illinois, 1877. Nobody would regulate what you do in your kitchen at home, but if you offer food for sale, your kitchen is subject to regulation because its use affects the public. Sanitation rules apply, for example. Your kitchen is still private property, but not private in the sense of "personal."

In this Civil Rights Act the public is considered as everyone who might accept your offer of something for sale. Privately owned public facilities, such as restaurants, hotels, transportation, stores, and places of entertainment are now obliged by law to accommodate customers without regard to race, and they are also subject to regulation in this regard.

Page 1 of 12, Next >>