Beachlawn Building Corp. v. City of St. Clair Shores

How courts have described this case

Verbatim parenthetical descriptions written by other courts when citing this decision. Ranked by citation-network relevance.

• determining that builder did not pay municipalities’ building fees voluntarily because fees were unlawful exactions paid under compulsion or duress of discontinuing builder’s business
• “Duress exists when one by the unlawful act of another is induced to make a contract or perform some act under circumstances which deprive him of the exercise of free will.” (quoting Hackley v. Headley, 8 N.W. 511, 512–13 (Mich. 1881))
• “[P]laintiff's payments were involuntary, made under the compulsion or duress of being denied the right to continue its business unless it paid the unlawful exactions,” which were “in excess of the cost of issuing the license and regulating the business to which they applied.”

Source: CourtListener parenthetical corpus (CC0).