This summer, I learned the reasoning behind why West Drive in
the Hein Park Neighborhood just east of Rhodes did not connect to Jackson
Avenue like most other streets—a 1981 lawsuit that went all the way to the US
Supreme Court. In the City of Memphis vs. Greene, the residents of Hein Park,
one hundred percent white, stated their reasons for wanting West Drive blocked
at Jackson were to reduce traffic flow through the small subdivision, increase
safety to children and students walking to school, and reduce litter, noise,
and pollution in their community as a result of the traffic. The plaintiffs’
argument said that the blocking was a violation of property rights and had a
racially discriminatory intent, as the overwhelmingly majority of residents
north of Hein Park were black. The Supreme Court held the closing valid, saying
that it did not support the Court of Appeals decision of invalidity due to
“adversely affecting respondents’ ability to hold and enjoy their property.”
There was no injury under Section 1982 of the Civil Rights Act.
A few years
ago, again in Memphis, history did not repeat itself. Residents near Goodwyn
Street proposed to have a barrier placed between the entrance of their affluent
neighborhood and the poorer, black neighborhoods south near Southern Avenue. The
Land Use Control Board denied the request. Of course, there were plenty of
obvious reasons from a traffic and city planning standpoint as to the denial,
but the race question was still brought up. Over twenty-five years after the highest
courts ruled a Memphis neighborhood street closing legal, a similar situation
had the opposite outcome. In Memphis’s largely segregated neighborhoods, does a
street closing allegedly restricting access to property violate civil rights? Do
you think the Supreme Court’s decision in 1981 was correct?
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