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SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
_________________
No. 98-1288
_________________
VILLAGE OF WILLOWBROOK, ET AL., PETITIONERS
v. GRACE OLECH
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT
[February 23, 2000]
    PER CURIAM.
    Respondent Grace Olech and her late husband
Thaddeus asked petitioner Village of Willowbrook to
connect their property to the municipal water supply.  The
Village at first conditioned the connection on the Olechs
granting the Village a 33-foot easement.  The Olechs
objected, claiming that the Village only required a 15-foot
easement from other property owners seeking access to
the water supply.  After a 3-month delay, the Village
relented and agreed to provide water service with only a
15-foot easement.
    Olech sued the Village claiming that the Village's de-
mand of an additional 18-foot easement violated the Equal
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.  Olech
asserted that the 33-foot easement demand was "irrational
and wholly arbitrary"; that the Village's demand was
actually motivated by ill will resulting from the Olechs'
previous filing of an unrelated, successful lawsuit against
the Village; and that the Village acted either with the
intent to deprive Olech of her rights or in reckless disre-
gard of her rights.  App. 10, 12.
    The District Court dismissed the lawsuit pursuant to
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) for failure to state
a cognizable claim under the Equal Protection Clause.
Relying on Circuit precedent, the Court of Appeals for the
Seventh Circuit reversed, holding that a plaintiff can
allege an equal protection violation by asserting that state
action was motivated solely by a "'spiteful effort to "get"
him for reasons wholly unrelated to any legitimate state
objective.'"  160 F. 3d 386, 387 (CA7 1998) (quoting Esmail
v. Macrane, 53 F. 3d 176, 180 (CA7 1995)).  It determined
that Olech's complaint sufficiently alleged such a claim.
160 F. 3d, at 388. We granted certiorari to determine
whether the Equal Protection Clause gives rise to a cause
of action on behalf of a "class of one" where the plaintiff
did not allege membership in a class or group.*
    Our cases have recognized successful equal protection
claims brought by a "class of one," where the plaintiff
alleges that she has been intentionally treated differently
from others similarly situated and that there is no rational
basis for the difference in treatment.  See Sioux City
Bridge Co. v. Dakota County, 260 U. S. 441 (1923); Alle-
gheny Pittsburgh Coal Co. v. Commission of Webster Cty.,
488 U. S. 336 (1989). In so doing, we have explained that
"'[t]he purpose of the equal protection clause of the Four-
teenth Amendment is to secure every person within the
State's jurisdiction against intentional and arbitrary
discrimination, whether occasioned by express terms of a
statute or by its improper execution through duly consti-
tuted agents.'"  Sioux City Bridge Co., supra, at 445
(quoting Sunday Lake Iron Co. v. Township of Wakefield,
247 U. S. 350, 352 (1918)).
    That reasoning is applicable to this case.  Olech's com-
plaint can fairly be construed as alleging that the Village
intentionally demanded a 33-foot easement as a condition
of connecting her property to the municipal water supply
where the Village required only a 15-foot easement from
other similarly situated property owners. See Conley v.
Gibson, 355 U. S. 41, 45-46 (1957).  The complaint also
alleged that the Village's demand was "irrational and
wholly arbitrary" and that the Village ultimately con-
nected her property after receiving a clearly adequate 15-
foot easement. These allegations, quite apart from the
Village's subjective motivation, are sufficient to state a
claim for relief under traditional equal protection analysis.
We therefore affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals,
but do not reach the alternative theory of "subjective ill
will" relied on by that court.
It is so ordered.

* We note that the complaint in this case could be read to allege a
class of five.  In addition to Grace and Thaddeus Olech, their neighbors
Rodney and Phyllis Zimmer and Howard Brinkman requested to be
connected to the municipal water supply, and the Village initially
demanded the 33-foot easement from all of them.  The Zimmers and
Mr. Brinkman were also involved in the previous, successful lawsuit
against the Village, which allegedly created the ill will motivating the
excessive easement demand.  Whether the complaint alleges a class of
one or of five is of no consequence because we conclude that the number
of individuals in a class is immaterial for equal protection analysis.



SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
_________________
No. 98-1288
_________________
VILLAGE OF WILLOWBROOK, ET AL., PETITIONERS
v. GRACE OLECH
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT
[February 23, 2000]

    JUSTICE BREYER, concurring in the result.
    The Solicitor General and the village of Willowbrook
have expressed concern lest we interpret the Equal Pro-
tection Clause in this case in a way that would transform
many ordinary violations of city or state law into viola-
tions of the Constitution.  It might be thought that a rule
that looks only to an intentional difference in treatment
and a lack of a rational basis for that different treatment
would work such a transformation.  Zoning decisions, for
example, will often, perhaps almost always, treat one
landowner differently from another, and one might claim
that, when a city's zoning authority takes an action that
fails to conform to a city zoning regulation, it lacks a
"rational basis" for its action (at least if the regulation in
question is reasonably clear).
    This case, however, does not directly raise the question
whether the simple and common instance of a faulty zon-
ing decision would violate the Equal Protection Clause.
That is because the Court of Appeals found that in this
case respondent had alleged an extra factor as well-a
factor that the Court of Appeals called "vindictive action,"
"illegitimate animus," or "ill will." 160 F. 3d 386, 388 (CA7
1998).  And, in that respect, the court said this case re-
sembled Esmail v. Macrane, 53 F. 3d 176 (CA7 1995),
because the Esmail plaintiff had alleged that the munici-
pality's differential treatment "was the result not of prose-
cutorial discretion honestly (even if ineptly-even if arbi-
trarily) exercised but of an illegitimate desire to 'get' him."
160 F. 3d at 388.
    In my view, the presence of that added factor in this
case is sufficient to minimize any concern about trans-
forming run-of-the-mill zoning cases into cases of constitu-
tional right.  For this reason, along with the others men-
tioned by the Court, I concur in the result.