Burton v. Wilmington Parking Authority
The Supreme Court ruled that a restaurant leasing space inside a publicly owned parking garage in Wilmington, Delaware could not refuse to serve a customer because he was Black, because the restaurant's ties to the government-run garage made its discrimination the government's own doing.
The decision expanded the reach of the Constitution's equal protection guarantee to private businesses that are financially and physically intertwined with government property, a principle that would shape how courts evaluated discrimination by private actors operating on public land for years to come.
“The State has so far insinuated itself into a position of interdependence with Eagle that it must be recognized as a joint participant in the challenged activity, which, on that account, cannot be considered to have been so "purely private" as to fall without the scope of the Fourteenth Amendment.”
The Court's central conclusion that the state and the restaurant were joint participants in the discrimination.
How it got here: Delaware's Court of Chancery ruled for the customer, but the Delaware Supreme Court reversed; he then took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Case in Depth
What happened
A restaurant called Eagle Coffee Shoppe leased space inside a parking garage owned and run by the Wilmington Parking Authority, a Delaware state agency. In 1958 the restaurant refused to serve a Black customer solely because of his race. He sued, arguing the refusal violated his right to equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment because the restaurant operated inside a government building.
The question before the Court
Could a privately run restaurant inside a government-owned parking garage refuse to serve a Black customer just because of his race?
Why it matters
Businesses that lease space from government agencies, especially ones that share profits, tax breaks, or physical structures with a public building, could no longer assume they were free to discriminate simply because they were privately operated. The ruling gave civil rights lawyers a powerful tool to challenge segregation in restaurants, theaters, and other businesses tied to public property.
What changes now
The case was sent back to the Delaware courts for further proceedings consistent with the Supreme Court's ruling that the restaurant's refusal to serve the customer amounted to unconstitutional state action. The decision was final on the constitutional question of state involvement, though the Delaware courts still had to apply that ruling on remand. The Court cautioned that its fact-specific approach did not create an automatic rule for every government lease.
What this does not decide
The Court expressly said it was not creating a universal rule that applies to every government leasing arrangement. It emphasized that its conclusion rested on the particular facts here — the financial interdependence, public funding, and physical integration of the restaurant with the garage — not on a general test for all private businesses on public property.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Stewart
Justice Stewart agreed the judgment should be reversed but on a narrower, more direct ground: the Delaware statute itself, as interpreted by the state's highest court, authorized restaurants to refuse service based on race, and any law authorizing racial discrimination by name is unconstitutional. He would not have reached the broader state-action analysis the majority undertook.
Dissent — Justice Frankfurter
Justice Frankfurter argued the Delaware Supreme Court's ruling was genuinely ambiguous as to whether it read the statute as authorizing race-based refusals or merely restating existing common law. He believed the Court should not resolve the broad state-action question until it was clear which reading was correct, and joined Harlan's proposal to send the case back for clarification.
Dissent — Justice Harlan
“I find it unnecessary, however, to inquire into the matter at this stage, for it seems to me apparent that before passing on the far-reaching constitutional questions that may, or may not, be lurking in this judgment, the case should first be sent back to the state court for clarification”Harlan's argument that the Court should have avoided the constitutional question by seeking clarification first.
Justice Harlan, joined by Justice Whittaker, criticized the majority's state-action reasoning as an unclear mix of factual considerations undercut by its own disclaimers. He argued the Court should first ask the Delaware Supreme Court to clarify whether its ruling rested on an interpretation of the statute that authorized racial discrimination, which would resolve the case on narrower grounds without reaching the constitutional state-action question.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court began from the settled principle that the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection guarantee only restrains action by government, not purely private conduct, however unfair that conduct might be. The question was whether the restaurant's discrimination could fairly be treated as the State's own action.
- The Court explained that there is no fixed formula for deciding when private conduct becomes attributable to the state; instead, courts must sift the facts and circumstances of each case to see how deeply the government has become involved.
- The Court found the restaurant and the parking garage were financially and physically interdependent: the building was publicly owned, the restaurant's rent helped keep the garage financially viable, the government paid for upkeep and repairs, and public signs and flags marked the building as a public facility.
- Because the government agency had the power to require nondiscriminatory service in the lease but chose not to, and because it profited from the arrangement, the Court concluded the State had become a joint participant in the discrimination rather than a passive landlord.
- The Court concluded that when a state leases public property in this manner and for this purpose, the restaurant leasing that property must follow the Fourteenth Amendment's rules just as if they were written into the lease itself.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms Civil Rights Cases (109 U.S. 3)
The Court relied on this 1883 decision's rule that the Fourteenth Amendment only restrains government action, not purely private conduct.
Reaffirms Cooper v. Aaron (358 U.S. 1)
The Court used this case's broader description of state responsibility arising from state participation in private conduct.