Heart of Atlanta Motel

United State of America

Heart of Atlanta Motel is a 216 room motellocated at the intersection of twointerstates in Atlanta, Georgia

Heart of Atlanta Motel hosts mostly out ofstate guests

Heart of Atlanta Motel would like tocontinue to exclude black Americans fromstaying there

Heart of Atlanta Motel sued the UnitedState of America to find the Civil RightsAct of 1964 unconstitutional asexceeding the Commerce Clause

The case was initially tried in the NorthernDistrict Court of Georgia in 1964 the Courtruled against Heart of Atlanta Motel

Heart of Atlanta Motel appealed, and the Supreme Court of the United Statesdecided to hear the case without itproceeding through the 11th Circuit.

The court observed that 75% of the Heartof Atlanta Motel's clientele came fromoutofstate, and that it was strategicallylocated near Interstates 75 and 85 as wellas two major Georgia highways, the Courtfound that the business clearly affectedinterstate commerce.

The court was not within its authorityunder the Commerce Clause to passthe Civil Rights Act of 1964

Its 5th amendment rights were violatedand this impacted the use of property andcompensation

Means of regulation are okay as long asthe end is constitutional

Plaintiff must show that the Civil Rights Actof 1964 violated its 5th amendment andresulted in unjust deprivation of its property

"Deprivation of personal dignity that surelyaccompanies denials of equal access topublic establishments,” Heart of AtlantaMotel, Inc. v. United States, means that anantidiscrimination law fulfills its purposewhen it reaches all, not simply most, publicaccommodations

The Supreme Court upheld theconstitutionality of the publicaccommodations provisions of the CivilRights Act of 1964 in Heart of AtlantaMotel, Inc. v. United States. The SupremeCourt agreed that Congress possessed theauthority to outlaw discrimination in publicaccommodations on the basis of race. Heartof Atlanta Motel, Inc., Congress acted againto outlaw discrimination in publicaccommodation.

This prevented Heart of Atlanta fromdiscriminating against patrons based onrace

Alfonso Lopez brought a gun to schooland was convicted of violating the GunFree School Zones Act of 1990

Jean Martignon operated MidnightRecords and was indicted by a federalgrand jury for selling unauthorizedrecordings of live performances