Argument of Speaker
Mr. Speaker: The opinion of the court in number 94-23 the City of Edmonds v. Oxford House will be announced by Justice Ginsburg.
Argument of Justice Ginsburg
Mr. Ginsburg: This case concerns a provision of the Federal Fair Housing Act.
The provision totally exempts from the act’s requirements, reasonable restrictions regarding the maximum number of occupants permitted to occupy a dwelling.
The parties disagree on the breadth of that total exemption and so do the Federal Courts of Appeals.
The dispute before us involves Oxford House which operates in the City of Edmonds, State of Washington, a group home housing 10-12 persons recovering from alcoholism or drug addition.
The group home is located in a neighborhood zone for single family dwellings.
The City of Edmonds zoning code defines a family as related persons without regard to number or five or fewer unrelated persons.
Because the occupants of Oxford house are not related, the city charged that the group home violated its zoning code.
Oxford house asserts that its home in Edmonds is sheltered by the Fair Housing Act which prohibits discrimination against persons with handicaps, recovering drug addicts and alcoholics it is undisputed here, qualify as handicap persons within the meaning of the act.
The court of first instance, a Federal District Court in the State of Washington agreed with the City of Edmonds it ruled that the provision of the city’s zoning code defining family restricted the maximum number of occupants for dwelling and was therefore exempt from Fair Housing Act governance but the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed that determination.
We granted review to settle the conflict illustrated by the diverse decisions of the District Court and the Court of Appeals.
We hold today that the Fair Housing Act exemption for rules setting the maximum number of occupants for dwelling does not sort the Edmond’s zoning code definition of family.
That definition describes who may compose a family unit?
It does not prescribe the maximum number of occupants a dwelling may house.
Rules of the later kind set absolute feelings, total occupancy limits not in relation to families but in order to prevent over crowing in dwellings.
Concluding that the City of Edmonds’ zoning code rule defining families does not qualify for the Fair Housing Acts absolute exemption, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
Justice Thomas has filed a dissenting opinion in which Justice Scalia and Justice Kennedy joined.
