Supreme Court Agrees to Review Eviction Procedures in Low Income Public Housing Projects

    President 
Hon. Francis E. Rivers 

PRESS RELEASE Director-Counset 
egal efense und Jack Grseuliers 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND, INC. feiss DeVore 10 Columbus Circle, New York, N.Y. 10019 * JUdson 6-8397 Se ee 

FOR RELEASE 
FRIDAY 
December 9, 1966 

SUPREME COURT AGREES TO REVIEW 
EVICTION PROCEDURES IN LOW 
INCOME PUBLIC HCUSING PROJECTS 

LDF Petition Could Affect 1400 Housing Authorities in U.S. 

WASHINGTON---The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to review the case of a 
mother with three children who received a 15-day eviction notice from 
a low income housing project, without a hearing, the day after she was 
elected president of the Parents' Club, a tenant group. 

The petition for review was filed by the NAACP Legal Defense and 
Educational Fund, Inc, (LDF)* attorneys in behalf of Mrs. Joyce C, 
Thorpe, a resident in a low income housing project in Durham, N.C. 

The case is of “substantial public importance," argued the LDF 
attorneys, since "its resolution has ramifications affecting the rights 
of recipients to all forms of welfare benefits.” 

This is the first time the nation's highest court has agreed to review 
the "rights of a tenant" in public housing to be free from arbitrary 
eviction. There are approximately 1400 local housing authorities with 
low-rent projects throuchout the United States. 

The LDF attorneys argued that Mrs. Thorpe, in receiving notice of 
eviction and being denied a hearing, was denied rights guaranteed by 
the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and the First and 
Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. 

"In addition," the LDF brief says, "the broader question is involved 
of the right of persons receiving any public welfare benefits to at 
least a bare minimum of procedural protection before the very necessi- 
ties for life are taken from them." 

Currently, the local public housing authorities follow a procedure of 
drawing up the tenant leases on a month-to-month basis. "This prac- 
tice," the lawyers asserted, "does permit evictions to be accomplished 
after the giving of a notice to vacate which does not state the reasons 
therefor," 

This is the first case in LDF's new program of litigation to protect 
and establish the rights of poor people. 

LDF has recently become involved in cases seeking t> make precedent of 
poverty law questions just as it has done over the years in civil 
rights. 

The LDF attorneys who filed the petition are Director-Counsel Jack 
Greenberg, James MM, Nabrit III, Charles Stephen Ralston, Michael 
Meltsner, Charles H. Jones, Jr., and Sheila Rush Jones of the New York 
office, and M.C. Burt of Durham, 

They were joined by attorneys Edward V, Sparer, Martin Garbus, and 
Howard Thorkelscn of the Center for Social Welfare Policy and Law of 
Columbia University, 

=30- 

* This is a separate, independent organization from the NAACP, The 
names are similar because the Legal Defense Fund was established as 
a different organization by the NAACP and through the years has gained 
complete autonomy, 

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