Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co.

Headnotes

1. Constitutional Law — Ripeness — Equitable Jurisdiction A landowner seeking to enjoin enforcement of a zoning ordinance need not first apply for a building permit or for relief from the board administering the ordinance where the gravamen of the bill is that the ordinance of its own force operates unconstitutionally to reduce the value of the land and destroy its marketability, and the attack is not against specific provisions but against the ordinance in its entirety. 272 U.S. at 386
2. Constitutional Law — Construction of Guarantees While the meaning of constitutional guaranties never varies, the scope of their application must expand or contract to meet the new and different conditions which are constantly coming within the field of their operation. 272 U.S. at 386
3. Constitutional Law — Police Power — Scope The question whether the power exists to forbid the erection of a building of a particular kind or for a particular use, like the question whether a particular thing is a nuisance, is to be determined by considering the building or the thing, not abstractly, but in connection with the circumstances and the locality. 272 U.S. at 387
4. Constitutional Law — Judicial Review If the validity of the legislative classification for zoning purposes is fairly debatable, the legislative judgment must be allowed to control. 272 U.S. at 388
5. Constitutional Law — Police Power — Building Regulations There is no serious difference of opinion as to the validity of laws and regulations fixing the height of buildings within reasonable limits, the character of materials and methods of construction, and the adjoining area which must be left open, in order to minimize the danger of fire or collapse, the evils of over-crowding, and the like, and excluding from residential sections offensive trades, industries, and structures likely to create nuisances. 272 U.S. at 388
6. Constitutional Law — Police Power — Exclusion of Industry The police power may be extended to a general exclusion from residential districts of all industrial establishments, though some may not be dangerous or offensive; the inclusion of a reasonable margin to insure effective enforcement will not stamp a law otherwise valid as invalid. 272 U.S. at 388
7. Constitutional Law — Police Power — Diversion of Development The power to relegate industrial establishments to localities separate from residential sections is not to be denied upon the ground that its exercise will divert a flow of industrial development from the course it would otherwise follow and thereby injure the complaining landowner. 272 U.S. at 389
8. Constitutional Law — Police Power — Residential Districts The police power generally supports an ordinance forbidding the erection in designated residential districts of business houses, retail stores and shops, and other like establishments, and of apartment houses in detached-house sections, since such ordinances, apart from special applications, cannot be declared clearly arbitrary and unreasonable and without substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals, or general welfare. 272 U.S. at 390–398
9. Constitutional Law — Zoning — Piecemeal Review Where an injunction is sought against a zoning ordinance on the broad ground that its mere existence and threatened enforcement, by materially and adversely affecting values and curtailing market opportunities, constitute a present and irreparable injury, and the court finds the ordinance valid in its general scope and dominant features, the court will not scrutinize its provisions sentence by sentence to determine by piecemeal dissection whether minor provisions, administrative matters, or provisions not shown to contribute to the injury complained of might, if attacked separately, fail the test of constitutionality. 272 U.S. at 395–398