California bill would remove bigoted real estate language, such as ‘whites only’
For nearly 100 years, buyers of certain homes in the Bay Area and beyond have been forced to sign paperwork bearing an ugly rule: You must be white to live in this house.
Those rules are no longer enforceable, but for many they remain a painful reminder of the state’s racist history. A new bill, announced last week by a group of California legislators, could change that.
“These covenants are appalling and a reminder that communities of color have been and continue to be discriminated against publicly and privately,” Assemblywoman Autumn Burke, DLos
Angeles, wrote in a news release detailing plans for legislation to be introduced later this year.
The bill would remove racial covenants — agreements prohibiting property owners from selling to certain racial groups — from real estate documents throughout California. Such agreements were common in the 1930s and 1940s, and though they were deemed illegal by the Supreme Court in 1948, they remain on the books because there is no mechanism in California to completely remove them.
Racist language still found in Bay Area property deeds includes rules stating “no person of any race other than the Caucasian or White race” may use or occupy the property, with the exception of “domestic servants of a different race domiciled with an owner or tenant.” Others prohibit residents of “African, Mongolian or Japanese” descent.
“It is time to remove racial housing covenants that are a byproduct of our racist past,” Assemblyman Kevin McCarty, D-Sacramento, wrote in the news release. “Eliminating these housing covenants is a moral right and an important step in bringing racial justice to Californians.”
McCarty, Burke, Assemblyman David Chiu, D-San Francisco, and Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, plan to introduce the bill later this year.
The proposed legislation follows a similar attempt several years ago to eliminate racial covenants. That bill was vetoed in 2009 by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who argued its effect would be negligible because the covenants already are unenforceable. He also worried about the cost of modifying property deeds containing racial covenants.
Language for the new bill hasn’t been introduced yet, but the legislators say it will be modeled after AB 2204 — the legislation vetoed in 2009. That bill would have required county officials to strike out illegal restrictions in property deeds based on factors including race, color, national origin, sexual orientation and disability. Those changes were to be made in the original property documents, which would then be
refiled without the discriminatory language.
The bill would have required staff to search documents for discriminatory language every time a property title transfer was filed for a home built before 1964 — creating additional work and expense for the county.
Most racial covenants already come with a disclaimer saying they are void. And in 2000, California set up an optional process for homeowners to add
a document to their property file with the racial language stricken out. That redacted document sits on top of the original, but does not replace it, so a record of the racist language remains.
The current process is rarely used in the Bay Area. And to some, it’s not enough.
The state should have removed racial covenants from its property records years ago, said Betty Williams, president of the Greater Sacramento NAACP.
“For me, it’s validation that America says this is wrong. We need to have
that,” she said. “Anyone who thinks that we don’t is under a rock somewhere.”
Williams hopes the new bill will spark nationwide change, culminating in a federal law that abolishes racial covenants. With the country now opening its eyes to the impact of generations of institutional racism — thanks to the Black Lives Matter movement and outrage over recent police killings of Black men and women — Williams thinks the legislators’ bill stands a better chance of success than in 2009.
“The time is right,” she said. “The time is absolutely right.”