Court Opinion

ID: 9655486
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 19:12:08.105413+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:19.064198
License: Public Domain

Williams, C.J.
(dissenting). This case brings into question the constitutionality of a township zoning ordinance which limits the occupancy of single-family residences to not more than two unrelated persons while not limiting the number of persons related by blood, marriage, or adoption. While I agree with the majority’s holding that the zoning ordinance is a legitimate exercise of the township’s police power under the United States Constitution, I disagree with their conclusion that it violates due process under our state constitution.
The appropriate standard for reviewing a challenge to the constitutionality of a zoning ordinance was set forth by this Court in Kirk v Tyrone Twp, 398 Mich 429, 439-440; 247 NW2d 848 (1976):
"The important principles require that for an ordinance to be successfully challenged plaintiffs prove:
" '[F]irst, that there is no reasonable governmental interest being advanced by the present zoning classification itself * * * or
" '[S]econdly, that an ordinance may be unreasonable because of the purely arbitrary, capricious and unfounded exclusion of other types of legitimate land use from the area in question.’ [Kropf v Sterling Heights,] 391 Mich 139, 158[; 215 NW2d 179 (1974)].
"The four rules for applying these principles were also outlined in Kropf. They are:
"1. ' "[T]he ordinance comes to us clothed with every presumption of validity.” ’ 391 Mich 139, 162, quoting from Brae Burn, Inc v Bloomfield Hills, 350 Mich 425; 86 NW2d 166 (1957).
"2. ' "[I]t is the burden of the party attacking to prove affirmatively that the ordinance is an arbitrary and unreasonable restriction upon the owner’s use of his *280property * * *. It must appear that the clause attacked is an arbitrary fiat, a whimsical ipse dixit, and that there is no room for a legitimate difference of opinion concerning its reasonableness.” ’ 391 Mich 139, 162, quoting Brae Burn, Inc.
"3. 'Michigan has adopted the view that to sustain an attack on a zoning ordinance, an aggrieved property owner must show that if the ordinance is enforced the consequent restrictions on his property preclude its use for any purposes to which it is reasonably adapted.’ 391 Mich 139, 162-163.
"4. ' "This Court, however, is inclined to give considerable weight to the findings of the trial judge in equity cases.” ’ 391 Mich 139, 163, quoting Christine Building Co v City of Troy, 367 Mich 508, 518; 116 NW2d 816 (1962).”
The majority opinion, however, fails to adhere to these principles and instead applies a rational relationship standard of review which has generally been employed by this Court in non-zoning matters. The majority reasons that because the dispute here concerns occupants of land rather than competing land uses the principles applicable in traditional zoning cases are inappropriate. Regardless of whether an ordinance is viewed as a regulation of land uses or occupants of land, the principles articulated in Kirk and other well-established Michigan precedent are nonetheless applicable and should not be so hastily discarded.
Zoning ordinances have long been accorded every presumption of constitutionality. Kirk, supra, p 439. Moreover, as mandated by our constitution, this Court is required to liberally construe all constitutional provisions and laws pertaining to counties, townships, cities and villages. Const 1963, art 7, § 34.
This judicial deference to the validity of municipality zoning laws is premised on the fact that *281zoning matters are essentially legislative and not judicial functions. In Brae Burn, Inc v Bloomfield Hills, supra, pp 430-431, this Court elaborated on this fundamental principle:
"[T]his Court does not sit as a superzoning commission. Our laws have wisely committed to the people of a community themselves the determination of their municipal destiny, the degree to which the industrial may have precedence over the residential, and the areas carved out of each to be devoted to commercial pursuits. With the wisdom or lack of wisdom of the determination we are not concerned. The people of the community, through their appropriate legislative body, and not the courts, govern its growth and its life. Let us state the proposition as clearly as may be: It is not our function to approve the ordinance before us as to wisdom or desirability. For alleged abuses involving such factors the remedy is the ballot box, not the courts. We do not substitute our judgment for that of the legislative body charged with the duty and responsibility in the premises. As Willoughby phrased it in his treatise, Constitution of the United States (2d ed, 1929), vol 1, § 21, p 32: 'The constitutional power of a law-making body to legislate in the premises being granted, the wisdom or expediency of the manner in which that power is exercised is not properly subject to judicial criticism or control.’ We held similarly in Tel-Craft Civic Ass’n v Detroit, 337 Mich 326, 331 [60 NW2d 294 (1953)]:
" 'Unless it can be shown that the council acted arbitrarily or unreasonably, their determination is final and conclusive and no court may alter or modify the ordinance as adopted.
"' "While it is within the province of the courts to pass upon the validity of statutes and ordinances, courts may not legislate nor undertake to compel legislative bodies to do so one way or another.” ’ ”
Thus, it is not for this Court to second-guess the wisdom of local zoning authorities absent a show*282ing that the ordinance is an arbitrary and capricious restriction and serves no governmental interest.
A companion rule to the judicial deference accorded to zoning matters is that the burden of proof rests upon the party attacking the validity of a zoning ordinance. Not only does the majority opinion bypass the extraordinary deference usually given to zoning ordinances, but it also appears to have impermissibly shifted the burden of proof onto plaintiff. The majority refers to the fact that the plaintiff has not convinced them that the classification at hand is reasonably related to the achievement of the stated goals of the ordinance. It is not, however, the plaintiff’s burden to demonstrate the reasonableness of the ordinance, but rather it is defendants’ burden to affirmatively prove the arbitrariness and capriciousness of the classification.
One of several reasons advanced by plaintiff in support of the ordinance is that it was designed to preserve traditional family values. It is clearly within the state’s police power to zone and regulate land use in promotion and preservation of the sanctity of the traditional family lifestyle. Village of Belle Terre v Boraas, 416 US 1, 9; 94 S Ct 1536; 39 L Ed 2d 797 (1974); see also Palo Alto Tenants Union v Morgan, 321 F Supp 908 (ND Cal, 1970), aff'd 487 F2d 883 (CA 9, 1973). The United States Supreme Court held in Belle Terre that the preservation of family values was a proper subject for zoning:
"A quiet place where yards are wide, people few, and motor vehicles restricted are legitimate guidelines in a land-use project addressed to family needs. This goal is a permissible one within Berman v Parker [348 US 26; 75 S Ct 98; 99 L Ed 27 (1954)]. The police power is not *283confined to elimination of filth, stench, and unhealthy places. It is ample to lay out zones where family values, youth values, and the blessings of quiet seclusion and clean air make the area a sanctuary for people.” (Emphasis added.) 416 US 9.
The special values the local legislative body might consider in its zoning decision might well be more expansive, but just as fundamental, as those mentioned by the United States Supreme Court. A biological family, for example, could have concerns about schools that other living units either might not share or might even actively oppose.
The importance of the family was reaffirmed in the case of Moore v East Cleveland, 431 US 494; 97 S Ct 1932; 52 L Ed 2d 531 (1977), wherein the Court struck down an ordinance which prohibited extended biological or legal families to live in an area zoned for single-family dwellings. Justice Powell, writing for the plurality of the Court, distinguished Belle Terre as a case in which "family needs” and "family values” were promoted since the ordinance there barred only unrelated persons whereas the ordinance in Moore, by restricting the number of related persons who could live together, had sliced "deeply into the family itself’. 431 US 498. Justice Powell also noted the foundational role of the family in our society:
"Our decisions establish that the Constitution protects the sanctity of the family precisely because the institution of the family is deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition. It is through the family that we inculcate and pass down many of our most cherished values, moral and cultural.” 431 US 503-504.
Justice Brennan, joining in the plurality opinion of Moore, wrote a separate concurrence, emphasizing the "preferred position” of the family:
*284"Whether it be the extended family of a more leisurely age or the nuclear family of today the role of the family in raising and training successive generations of the species makes it more important, we dare say, than any other social or legal institution * * *. If any freedom not speciñcally mentioned in the Bill of Rights enjoys a 'preferred position’ in the law it is most certainly the family. ” (Emphasis supplied by the Court, quoting from the Village of Belle Terre’s brief.) 431 US 511.1
Decisions from other state jurisdictions which have addressed identical constitutional challenges to zoning ordinances similar to the ordinance in the instant case have upheld their respective ordinances on the ground that maintenance of a traditional family environment constitutes a reasonable basis for excluding uses that may impair the stability of that environment and erode the values associated with a traditional family style of life. See Rademan v City of Denver, 186 Colo 250; 526 P2d 1325 (1974); Town of Durham v White Enterprises, Inc, 115 NH 645; 348 A2d 706 (1975); Ass’n for Educational Development v Hayward, 533 SW2d 579 (Mo, 1976); Penobscot Area Housing Development Corp v City of Brewer, 434 A2d 14 (Me, 1981); see, generally, Anno: Validity of ordinance restricting number of unrelated persons who can live together in residential zone, 12 ALR4th 238.
The two out-of-state cases cited by the majority in support of the claim that an ordinance drawn too close to the traditional family model is an over- and under-inclusive classification, New Jer*285sey v Baker, 81 NJ 99; 405 A2d 368 (1979), and Santa Barbara v Adamson, 27 Cal 3d 123; 164 Cal Rptr 539; 610 P2d 436 (1980), are wholly inapplicable in the instant case because they apply a different standard of review from that of Kropf and its progeny.
The majority does not dispute the township’s police power to enact ordinances supportive of the biological or legal family but does point out that the ordinance in the instant case is an unreasonable exercise of that power because less restrictive means might have been chosen to accomplish the same objective. Whether a municipality could have adopted less restrictive means to achieve the same goals is not a controlling factor in considering the constitutionality of a zoning ordinance. Rather, a reviewing court’s focus should be upon whether there exists some reasonable basis for the means actually employed. In making such a determination, if any state of facts either known or which could reasonably be assumed is presented in support of the ordinance, this Court must defer to the legislative judgment. Robinson Twp v Knoll, 410 Mich 293, 339; 302 NW2d 146 (1981) (dissent of Moody, J.); Shavers v Attorney General, 402 Mich 554, 613-614; 267 NW2d 72 (1978).
Zoning matters necessarily involve difficult choices between the inclusion of certain land uses and the exclusion of others in a particular area. The drawing of these lines is exclusively a legislative judgment. In Village of Belle Terre v Boraas, supra, 416 US 8, the United States Supreme Court specifically addressed this restriction on the power of the judiciary in zoning cases:
"It is said, however, that if two unmarried people can constitute a 'family,’ there is no reason why three or four may not. But every line drawn by a legislature *286leaves some out that might well have been included. That exercise of discretion, however, is a legislative, not a judicial, function.”
In my opinion, the majority has overstepped its bounds as a judicial body and has intruded into the legislative sphere by acting as a superzoning commission contrary to the pronouncement by the United States Supreme Court in Belle Terre and this Court in Brae Burn, Inc, supra, pp 430-431. The majority goes so far as to give examples of ordinances from other states which they suggest offer innovative approaches to preserve the family character of a neighborhood in a more rational manner than the ordinance in the instant case. These references are of legitimate interest to the Legislature, but not to the judiciary. The task of line drawing is solely a legislative one, and this Court should not even attempt to interfere in this legislative function.
On the basis of the record in the instant case, defendants have not sustained their burden of proof so as to rebut the presumption favoring the ordinance’s validity. It is not enough that defendants present evidence which raises a debatable question as to the reasonableness of the ordinance. The defendants must present sufficient evidence to prove that there is no room for a fair and legitimate difference of opinion that the classification drawn is an unreasonable exercise of the township’s police power. This defendants have failed to do.
For the foregoing reasons, I respectfully dissent. Accordingly, I would affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.
Boyle, J., concurred with Williams, C.J.

 Our national recognition of family values is consonant with religious traditions, where the family is central. We express family concerns in our laws in many ways; for example, family connections are priority considerations in immigration preferences, 8 USC 1153, and in draft deferments, 50 USC Appendix 456(h).