Thursday, April 20, 2017

Christie Loses 6-0 Despite Appointing the Judges

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie appointed five of the seven justices on the New Jersey Supreme Court so the court should be as conservative as Christie-the-candidate. But not one of these justices voted for the conservative side on one of the biggest issues in the state.

“Mount Laurel Doctrine” originated in New Jersey and is taught in law schools nationwide. It forces rural towns to establish affirmative action in housing. The New Jersey Supreme Court entered sweeping decisions in 1975 and 1983 to order municipalities to provide low-cost housing. These decisions supposedly prohibit so-called economic discrimination by municipalities, even though economic discrimination is not recognized as a civil right by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In implementation of these decisions, the New Jersey legislature enacted the so-called Fair Housing Act to create the Council on Affordable Housing (COAH). The purpose of COAH was to police hundreds of small towns in New Jersey to assess whether they were satisfying their obligation to provide low-cost housing.

But COAH has been ineffective for years and even stopped issuing regulations in 1999, resulting in ongoing litigation ever since. In 2015, the New Jersey Supreme Court held that delays in developing low-cost housing had persisted for too long. The Court ordered hundreds of towns to ignore COAH and instead bring their zoning plans before trial court judges to resolve the disputes.

But that decision was not good enough for civil rights advocates, who then insisted that remedies be ordered for the 16-year “gap period” between 1999 and 2015. During that gap period there were record foreclosures on properties, multiple recessions, and Hurricane Sandy. Despite this, the New Jersey Supreme Court held that the hundreds of small towns remain fully liable to the extent they did not satisfy their obligations during that gap period.

Mount Laurel Doctrine itself is not a bellwether judicial issue, but judges who embrace the concept of an evolving Constitution and legislating new rights are likely to be liberal on other issues also. Residents of New Jersey will now suffer for decades.

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