Suit Against Tennessee Motel Cracks Urban Renewal Bigotry
Press Release
July 31, 1963

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Press Releases, Volume 1. Suit Against Tennessee Motel Cracks Urban Renewal Bigotry, 1963. a115cd7e-b492-ee11-be37-00224827e97b. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/732557dc-4240-4d3c-be47-390e12748847/suit-against-tennessee-motel-cracks-urban-renewal-bigotry. Accessed April 22, 2025.
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PRESS RELEASE : NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND TOCOLUMBUS CIRCLE «+ NEWYORK19,N.Y. © JUdson 6-8397 DR. ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS JACK GREENBERG President Director-Counsel once Mor ose SUIT AGAINST TENNESSEE MOTEL CRACKS URBAN RENEWAL BIGOTRY July 31, 1963 NEW YORK -- The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. today announced victory in a suit that establishes the legal path for challenging discrimination taking place in any urban renewal program. The decision, handed down against a Tennessee motel chain, goes further than President Kennedy's executive housing order of November 2¢ 1962, and used the Constitution as its legal foundation. Jack Greenberg, director-counsel of the Legal Defense Fund, said that the U, S, Federal District Court ruling "denies the right of ee Holiday-Inns of America to decline accommodations to Negro citizens since it is situated on a federally underwritten urban renewal site. "The implications of the decision are vast," Mr. Greenberg con- * tinued, “for all the urban renewal projects constructed before President Kennedy's housing order and not expressly covered by it. "This decision also makes specific judicial relief available in instances of discrimination by urban renewal projects built since the Presidential order. "This will affect rental housing, homes for sale, commercial property and every other facility which has been built with urban renewal aid," the Legal Defense Fund's chief counsel said, The complaint was filed in the U, S, Federal District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee in February by Avon N, Williams and “2, Alexander Looby, NAACP Legal Defense Fund attorneys in Nashville; ‘A, W, Willis, Memphis; Mr. Greenberg, Constance Baker Motley and Frank Heffron, of New York City, They“represented Dr. Vasco A, Smith, Jr,, a Negro dentist from Memphis, who was denied accommodations at the Holiday Tagg ee tet Hill motel on December 4, 1962, The motel was built on land acquired from the Nashvajhle Housing Authority in 1958 and 1959. The Nashville Housing Authority had con- demned the redevelopment project area in 1952, of which 90% of the land was owned or occupied by Negroes.