The Missing Middle History of Massachusetts Zoning: State Overrides and Preemption in the Postwar Era

In 2021, Massachusetts sought to ease skyrocketing housing costs by enacting the MBTA Communities Act. This statute requires many cities and towns in the state to allow multifamily housing near transit stops. Scholars of local government and opponents of the law have often said that Massachusetts historically allowed municipalities to wield zoning power virtually unconstrained, but that summary glosses over important detail. Offering a new perspective on the evolving relationship between state and local power, this Note examines the history of state-level zoning law in Massachusetts. Adding to prior literature that highlighted the 1969 “Anti-Snob Zoning Law,” or Chapter 40B, it focuses on several Massachusetts statutes enacted between 1946 and 1959 that, respectively, overrode and preempted certain local zoning powers. Though often overlooked, these laws represent early precedents for Chapter 40B and the MBTA Communities Act. They also show that the state had already made pro-housing interventions against local zoning by the time Massachusetts voters preserved broad state preemption authority as part of the 1966 Home Rule Amendment. Although these earlier state interventions against exclusionary zoning did not ultimately solve the housing crisis, they laid the groundwork for the design of Chapter 40B and other provisions still in force today.