Bye Bye Property Rights...

[VulcanRider]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A city can take a person's home or business for a development project designed to revitalize a depressed local economy, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Thursday in a decision that could have nationwide impact.

...The residents opposed the plans to raze their homes and businesses to clear the way for a riverfront hotel, health club and offices. They argued that it amounted to an unconstitutional taking of their property, located on a peninsula that juts into the Thames River.

[Justice] Stevens upheld the city's plan under the U.S. Constitution, which allows the government to take private property through its eminent domain powers in exchange for just compensation.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice O'Conner wrote: "Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms. [Let's not forget the local politicians who get to spend the extra tax $$$$]

Read all about it

Eminent domain was to allow cities to build things to benefit the public -- roads, parks, water/septic/electric plants, etc. Now the Supreme Court has endorsed the city taking property away from one private owner specifically to give to another private owner because the city's tax revenue will benefit. I know of another case a few miles away from me just like it. They've been waiting for this judgement before continuing. We'll hear about more of them now...

[Timber Loftis]

I posted my thoughts on this at Oasis:

http://www.theoasisforums.com/yabbse...p?topic=3540.0

[Lucern]

Nice post TL, though I imagine the overthrow of a local government wouldn't require the help of too many hehe.

To add to the theme of incompetent local government, two local governments near me did two stupid things with taxpayer money, wholly opposite of eachother.

One took a substantial tax hike to buy the Dallas Cowboys, which moved em a whopping 15 or so miles. I don't know how many of you know about American football, but the Cowboys aren't a team you'd want to own imo lol. They moved whole neighborhoods of people to build the stadium, neighborhoods that were the target of attack ads in the run-up to the election on the matter, which would have killed their chances of selling them if the proposal failed.

Another local government gave the people the chance to lower their taxes. The people of course took this chance. They also simultaneously lost their public library, a brand new million dollar water park, their pool, and a handful of other services. Oops. I guess it was an "all or nothing" kinda thing.

[Cloudbringer]

I really question the integrity of such a law. It opens up all sorts of graft and corruption loopholes and definitely makes it less enticing to aspire to homeownership in any area that may be built up or over built soon!

[Albromor]

What stunned me was how many court justices from the "left" side suported this ruling. I figured it would be the conservatives leading this charge. I think this ruling is absolutely assinine.

[Ziroc]

My jaw totally fell open when I actually hear this. my god, has our constitution gone totally out the window?

And this is LESS Government?!?!


Here in Lakeland, they bought up a bunch of old apartments that seniors on a fixed income lived in because it was the only place cheap enough, well, the city wanted a highway through there, "OH WELL" they say... god...

[Cloudbringer]

Albromor, I agree, it was surprising who was backing that ruling!

Z! That sort of thing really makes me mad, I mean come ON! Putting the elderly out of their homes and leaving them with no low-cost equivalent housing alternatives? GRRR! At least they could build new ones or give contractors incentive to build new ones for the same rents. I really hate it when 'progress' does this to people!

[VulcanRider]

Justice? Sweet Revenge? Either way, I LOVE IT ! ! !

Press Release

For Release Monday, June 27 to New Hampshire media
For Release Tuesday, June 28 to all other media

Weare, New Hampshire (PRWEB) Could a hotel be built on the land owned by Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter? A new ruling by the Supreme Court which was supported by Justice Souter himself itself might allow it. A private developer is seeking to use this very law to build a hotel on Souter's land.

Justice Souter's vote in the "Kelo vs. City of New London" decision allows city governments to take land from one private owner and give it to another if the government will generate greater tax revenue or other economic benefits when the land is developed by the new owner.

On Monday June 27, Logan Darrow Clements, faxed a request to Chip Meany the code enforcement officer of the Towne of Weare, New Hampshire seeking to start the application process to build a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road. This is the present location of Mr. Souter's home.

Clements, CEO of Freestar Media, LLC, points out that the City of Weare will certainly gain greater tax revenue and economic benefits with a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road than allowing Mr. Souter to own the land.

The proposed development, called "The Lost Liberty Hotel" will feature the "Just Desserts Café" and include a museum, open to the public, featuring a permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America. Instead of a Gideon's Bible each guest will receive a free copy of Ayn Rand's novel "Atlas Shrugged."

Clements indicated that the hotel must be built on this particular piece of land because it is a unique site being the home of someone largely responsible for destroying property rights for all Americans.

"This is not a prank" said Clements, "The Towne of Weare has five people on the Board of Selectmen. If three of them vote to use the power of eminent domain to take this land from Mr. Souter we can begin our hotel development."

Clements' plan is to raise investment capital from wealthy pro-liberty investors and draw up architectural plans. These plans would then be used to raise investment capital for the project. Clements hopes that regular customers of the hotel might include supporters of the Institute For Justice and participants in the Free State Project among others.

http://www.freestarmedia.com/hotellostliberty2.html

[Ziroc]

Totally awesome! I hope EVERYONE that voted for the law gets their homes taken. This law is VERY bad, and I can see loads of greed corps abusing it for their own pocketbooks (Walmarts and such).

What will it take to repeal this law now? I mean, once they rule on it, and it's at the highest court, what can happen to change it? The President?

[Aerich]

Well, the president doesn't really have any direct influence over a ruling of the SCOTUS, or any other court, constitutional separation of powers and independent judiciaries being what they are... witness the relative lack of power of the presidential office in the Schiavo case, an instance where GWB clearly wished to intervene.

Generally, there's a few things that can happen to overturn or limit a SC ruling - I'm working from a Canadian perspective, but these should all still apply, I believe, perhaps with the exception of #1.

1) A legislative body (probably should be Congress, for a SCOTUS case), can pass legislation overturning the ruling. Typically, the case is not mentioned by name, but everybody knows why the legislation is passed.

An example of such legislation might be - "No land may be expropriated; Exception: land may be expropriated for a clearly public purpose if fair market value is paid in compensation; Clearly public purpose does not include increased munipal revenue from taxation on new developments."

I'm not entirely certain that your federal legislative body could pass something like that without stepping over the line into state jurisdiction.

2) The SC may directly overturn its own ruling - typically this type of intervention is rare, indicating a dramatic shift in policy, on par with the likes of Roe v. Wade or Brown v. Board of Education.

3) The SC may "distinguish" the case, limiting its operation in future cases. Generally, the court will pick a fact or set of facts from the original case, and refuse to apply the case to other cases unless the subsequent cases meet the same criteria.

4) #1 and #3 may be combined, and the courts may use subsequent cases to "clarify" their original meaning by limiting the scope of the case, redefining elements of the ruling, etc.

SCOTUS is really the only body that can alter this ruling. The best hope for people affected by expropriations for private developments is to take their issues to court, even if it looks like they have no shot. It is very possible that the court might reconsider or alter its reasoning to limit the application of this first ruling.