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Validity Of State Proposition Effectively Repealing Anti-Discrimination Laws, Anon

Washington Law Review

The California Legislature did not attempt to prevent property owners from selecting buyers or tenants on the basis of racial considerations until 1959. Then, by enacting the Hawkins Act and the Unruh Civil Rights Act, the legislature chose to regulate racial discrimination in all business establishments including those involving the selling or renting of residential property and in all publicly assisted housing. Three years later, by enacting the Rumford Fair Housing Act, the legislature extended the regulation of discriminatory conduct to owners of most, but not all, residential property. Plaintiffs alleged that, contrary to the express provisions of the Unruh …