Supreme Judicial Court - Mass Cases

111. The Trial CourL ... jmproperly .. upheld t.he HAC'S
.. st.ri kinq the condit-ioins lawful1
Hoard.
. order
. . y imposed by .-. the
Iri Iiuldiny for the HAC, t.he Trial Court. stated:
"To say t.hat. thaL anal.ysis has Lo be driven hy
whether somet.hiny is uneconomic and by a complex
burden shifting paradigm, it would scclrn t.o elevate a
form over import-ant subst.ance, as wc are 31.1. fami1i;ir
with Lliis concept. No one, no agency is above Chc
law. A 1oc;il ZBA cannot do whatever it wishes and
cannot, so thc HAC ruled here, so unnecessarily
complicate lhe administration of a low and moderate
income development ;IS 1.0 make it unworkahl e." RA
Vol.2, 169.
The '1'1-ial Court's conccrri that a local board of
appeals clrnild impose "imworkable" cmiditi~m~ on a
comprehensivc permi.t project j.s understood. [:hi.ef
Just-ice Marshall articulat.ed t.his cxact concern in her
Plaintiff rcyrets haviny to inform the ACLorney
Gcneral's office of the couriLless number of federal
and 3tat.e cascs holdi iiq thaL rest.ri cti.ons on Lhe
ownership OL 1iabl.t.at.iuii of real proper-ty due to race,
re1 iqion, national oriyiri or a1 jenagc is void as
ayainst public pnlicy. See among many others,
Uuchar.lan ,- v. Warley, 245 U.!;. 60 (1917) (restrict-ions on
the convenience of real property to nonwhites in
vio1at.i on oi thr: Constit.utiori's Fourteenth Amcncirr~ciit j
and Shelley v. ...,. -.. Kraemer, 334 U.S. 1 (1948) (restrictive
covenants, which have as their purpose Chc cxclusion
of persons of desiyriated race or color from the
ownership OL occi.ipancy of real. property rulcd inval id
as violati.on of equal prot-ection yuararitees j . There
is simply no support for the reckless suggest.ion t.hat
the Housiny Appeals Committee must st.and guard to
ensure that Chc illegal conditions proffered by the
At.torney Gcricral are struck ciowri. Such a cundilrion,
if ever a cit.y or t-own werc to impose same, would be
void ab initin as against public: policy.
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