Definition
Restrictive covenants are clauses written into the deed of a property that prohibit its sale, rental, or occupancy by members of specified racial, ethnic, or religious groups. They ran with the land — that is, they bound every future owner, not just the parties to the original sale.
In the United States, racial restrictive covenants spread rapidly after 1917 (when the Supreme Court in Buchanan v. Warley struck down explicit racial zoning ordinances). They covered an estimated three-quarters of Chicago's residential land by 1940 and large portions of Los Angeles, St. Louis, Detroit, Baltimore, and the new suburbs. They were rendered legally unenforceable by Shelley v. Kraemer (1948), but informal compliance continued for two more decades.
Why it matters
How it works
A racial restrictive covenant was typically a short clause attached to a deed at the moment of construction or first sale. A characteristic 1920s example would read: "No part of said premises shall ever be sold, leased, given, or rented to any person not of the Caucasian race." Variations excluded named groups specifically — Negroes, Mexicans, Asians, Jews, Italians — or used the white-only formulation.
Origins and spread
The Supreme Court in Buchanan v. Warley (1917) struck down city ordinances that drew the color line through zoning law. The decision left private contracts intact. Real-estate boards — the National Association of Real Estate Boards in particular — promoted the deed-level alternative as the constitutionally safe substitute. Builders of new subdivisions, especially in the suburban-development boom of the 1920s, attached restrictive covenants by default. By 1930 the practice was standard in nearly every Northern and Western city's new residential construction.
Enforcement before 1948
A homeowner who sold to a Black buyer could be sued by neighbors for damages, and the buyer could be enjoined from taking possession. Courts enforced these suits routinely in the 1930s and 1940s — there are reported cases in every major Northern city. The threat alone was usually sufficient: a white seller knew their neighbors would sue, and Black buyers knew the title would be clouded.
Shelley v. Kraemer, 1948
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court held that judicial enforcement of a racial restrictive covenant constituted state action and therefore violated the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. The covenants themselves remained valid as private contracts; only courts could no longer enforce them. Real-estate boards, neighborhood associations, and individual neighbors continued to enforce by social pressure, by mob violence at the color line, and by the financial mechanism (FHA refusal to insure mortgages in racially integrated neighborhoods).
After 1968
Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 (the Fair Housing Act) prohibited racial discrimination in the sale or rental of housing. The covenants became dead letter. Many remain on the books; some U.S. states now allow homeowners to file a one-page form to remove the offending language from their own title.