Hansberry v. Lee

An African-American man named Hansberry bought property from a person who had signed a restrictive covenant preventing property owners from selling land to African-Americans. Lee, one of its other signers, argued that the covenant should be enforced to enjoin the sale to Hansberry and that it was presumptively valid, based on an earlier case involving a class of landowners associated with the covenant. The document would be found valid only if 95 percent of the property owners signed it, and the trial court in the earlier case had made a finding of fact that the 95 percent requirement had been met. The Illinois Supreme Court found that it had not been met, but it still upheld the decision. Since the earlier case was a class action,the trial court ruled that the prior judgment would bind all members of the class, including the property owner who sold the land to Hansberry.