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Time Machine: Buchanan v. Warley (1917)


Vox's Jerusalem Demsas joins Matt and Dara on a time machine trip back to a WW1-era Supreme Court decision that shaped land use policy, zoning, and racial discrimination in housing. Discussion of Buchanan (and the related Euclid case decided nine years later) leads our hosts to talk a lot about the interrelated histories of zoning and racism in twentieth-century America.

Resources:

Buchanan v. Warley, 245 US 60 (1917)

Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Company, 272 US 365 (1926)

"The racial origins of zoning: Southern cities from 1910–1940" by Christopher Silver (Planning Perspectives; May 8, 2007)

"Prelude to Euclid: The United States Supreme Court and the Constitutionality of Land Use Regulation, 1900-1920" by Joseph Gordon Hylton (Washington University Journal of Law & Policy; January 2000)

"Race, Ethnicity, and Discriminatory Zoning" by Allison Shertzer, Tate Twinam, and Randall P. Walsh (NBER; 2018)

"The National Rise in Residential Segregation" by Trevon Logan & John Parman (NBER; Feb. 2015)

"The Impact of Zoning on Housing Affordability" by Edward L. Glaeser & Joseph Gyourko (NBER; March 2002)

American Society of Planning Officials Report on Rooming Houses (1957)


Hosts:

Matt Yglesias (@mattyglesias), Slowboring.com

Dara Lind (@DLind), Immigration Reporter, ProPublica

Jerusalem Demsas (@JerusalemDemsas), Policy reporter, Vox


Credits:

Erikk Geannikis (@erikk38), Producer

Ness Smith-Savedoff, Engineer


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