Brown v. Beuc’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

24 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 24 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““A zoning board of appeals cannot under the semblance of a variance exercise legislative powers [citations omitted]. The legislative body forms zoning policy in the shape of a comprehensive plan after ‘reasonable consideration, among other things, as to the character of the district and its peculiar suitability for particular uses’ [citation omitted]. The comprehensive plan, essentially general in scope, may cause disportionate injury to a property owner and, for the purpose of easing that injury, the board of appeals hears and determines individual applications for relief ‘in harmony with . . . [the] general purpose and intent’ of the ordinance [citation omitted]; and its determination to grant a variance must rest on ‘practical difficulties or unnecessary hardships in the way of carrying out the strict letter of such ordinances’ [citation omitted]. Thus, the statute makes plain that both the general purpose and intent of the ordinance, reflecting the policy of the legislative body, and the special case of the individual property owner, reflecting a practical difficulty or unnecessary hardship, must be considered by the board of appeals in varying the application of the ordinance. “When the variance violates the general purpose of the ordinance, the board of appeals invades the province of the legislative body, and the grant is invalid for want of authority [citations omitted]. More precisely, the board of appeals must make certain that the effect of a variance would not int”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Matthew v. Smith · Stice v. Gribben-Allen Motors, Inc.

2. “The phrase “practical difficulties or undue hardships” as contained in the Zoning Code does not refer to conditions personal to the owner of the land in question but rather refers to the conditions especially affecting the lot in question. Further, the practical difficulty or undue hardship relied on as a ground for a variance must be unusual or peculiar to the property involved and must be different from that suffered throughout the zone or neighborhood.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. State Ex Rel. Holly Inv. Co. v. BOARD OF ZONING ADJ. OF KANSAS CITY · Ogawa v. City of Des Peres

3. ““ * * * The board of zoning appeals is intrusted with the duty of enforcing the provisions of the ordinance; it is an administrative body, without a vestige of legislative power. It cannot therefore modify, amend, or repeal what the ordinance itself designates as its ‘general rules and regulations’; the power to do that is conferred upon the common council of Kansas City, and it can delegate no part of that power. The ordinance does not purport to authorize the board of zoning appeals to modify, amend, or repeal any of its provisions; but it does permit and direct the board to modify or partially suspend a rule in its application to a particular case where strict enforcement would ‘by reason of exceptional circumstances or surroundings constitute a practical difficulty or unnecessary hardship.’ This provision must be read in connection with section 7 of the Enabling Act, which provides that the board of adjustment shall have the power, ‘where there are practical difficulties or unnecessary hardship in the way of carrying out the strict letter of such ordinance, to vary or modify the application of any of the regulations or provisions of such ordinance relating to the use, construction or alteration of buildings or structures or the use of land so that the spirit of the ordinance shall be observed, public safety and welfare secured and substantial justice done.’ In other words, if in a specific case the enforcement of a regulation according to its strict letter would cause unn”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State Ex Rel. Meyer v. Kinealy