Shelley v. Kraemer was a significant United States Supreme Court case in Black history that was decided in 1948. The case involved a restrictive covenant in property deeds that barred African Americans and other racial minorities from purchasing or occupying certain homes in a neighborhood in St. Louis, Missouri.

The Shelley family, an African American family, purchased a home in one of these restricted areas in violation of the covenant. When a white couple, the Kraemers, later attempted to enforce the covenant in court to prevent the Shelleys from owning the property, the case eventually made its way to the Supreme Court.

In a landmark decision, the Supreme Court ruled that state courts could not enforce racially restrictive housing covenants because it violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The ruling in Shelley v. Kraemer was a crucial step in dismantling legal segregation and discrimination in housing, and it paved the way for greater civil rights protections in the United States.