Asymmetrical Information

Those are great questions.

The short answer to the first one is that no privately-held property is ever completely safe from being taken for public purposes, not even if it's in a state of conservation protection, and that was true before Kelo.

OTOH, there are higher burdens on the taking authority, such as the restriction in Federal law that blocks the use of parkland or historic sites for a federally-assisted transportation project except under compelling circumstances (the working term is "no feasible and practical alternative").

See this short explanation: http://www.nationaltrust.org/issues/transportation/4(f)_overview.html

The easiest answer to the second question is that the funds can be used to acquire other appropriate property on which a similar conservation easement can be placed. That would meet the goals of those who set up the original arrangement that the government just altered.

/f

I hadn't even thought of this angle, but Brian Noggle points out that Kelo might apply to more than just real property. I don't think his specific example flies, but consider this: There are authors who have always refused on principle to make movies out of their books. Kelo implies that the authors can be forced to take compensation in return for the movie rights' assignment to a studio, which can then go on to generate economic activity (and higher tax receipts) by making a film.

The 5th amendment says, in part: "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation." We usually think of "private property" to mean real estate, and eminent domain actions to be the "taking", but if we consider our money to be our property, then government has been taking it without just compensation, in the form of taxes, for many years. Good luck arguing this in tax court though.

The easiest thing to do is to find a way to give the land as a federal easement. Duke University did this with a bit of Duke Forest right before Chapel Hill was going to use eminent domain to seize it for a landfill. They temporarily turned it over to NASA as a federa easement. The federal government trumped Chapel Hill, so no new landfill on that land. (Chapel Hill had promised when they built their previous landfill on Duke Forest land that the next one would be elsewhere. But when it came time to find a site, unsurprisingly Duke Forest won again since no voters live there.)

In general, yes, conservation areas are subject to eminent domain. When it's a landfill there's nothing one can do, but, yes, I suppose Kelo opens the door for seizure for economic development too.

In answer to your questions:

1) Yes.

2) To be consistent with the trust's purposes, the fiduciaries ought to purchase conservation lands or easements as close to the original site as possible.

Trick question. The residents of these places will never allow local governments to develop. Why, that might let blacks and Jews in.

Other than the comments about "blacks and jews" I thing AT hit on something important. After Kelo, these decisions really do rest with local governments (usually) and it is tough to imagine one of the communities that you mention so valuing conservation then going against that urge. Not that it can't happen just not likely in my eyes.

Very interesting question. Perhaps made more interesting by the nature of the fact that my husband is part owner of his family's trust in Deer Isle, ME which contains a house on ocean front property (yeah, it sounds better than it is. The house has no electricity and no running water).

I think you need to look at the goal of the local government. In Deer Isle, I don't think there is much of a risk of the government taking the land to make a shopping mall or condos. There is no market for a shopping mall, no need for the condos. There is pleanty of land around that is for sale if there is really a mad desire to build one of those.

In addition, many of the reasons why people in areas such as Maine or the Berkshires have houses there is because of the nature and the lack of condos/malls. I suspect that, as opposed to New London, the bums really would get voted out if they tried to use eminent domain to do a land grab, no matter what the politicians might want to do.

Could they take the land? Probably. Would they? Seems unlikely. But then again, I'm often naive about sich things.

"it is tough to imagine one of the communities that you mention so valuing conservation then going against that urge. Not that it can't happen just not likely in my eyes."

Well - I've found there is often a 'town and gown' tension. Certainly the example in the Adirondacks above. But I'm also aware of a preservation Trust in Litchfield County Connecticut (involving a lot of moneyed household names like Chubb, Hammond, Colgate, Waterston) where the permanent residents of the town would like to have a bit more dense development than the landed gentry (who prefer 100-acre wilderness tracts!). The conservation trusts are a way to control the land, pretty up your weekend/retirement neighborhood, control the land after you die...all with a tax break at the expense of the school district, etc... and all despite a stultifyingly dominant political sensibility of Manhattan West Side progressivism.

Oh- and the Rockefellers, who control a huge amount of Coastal Maine, don't vote.

Consider also the case of Charles Cawley and Camden/Rockport Maine...

These land trust holdings are as safe as the current makeup of the sitting legislature. No more, no less.

In the 19th and early 20th Century, these arrangements were swept away by anti-mortmain laws.

They'll come again:
http://cwbn.blogspot.com/2004/03/sunday-it-will-come-as-shock-to-many.html

Terribly dorry, I almost nevr post links in the comments here, but I thought this one was important. While I think we all feel the the Kelo decision was terrible for a variety of reasons, I think there may be an up side. Please see the following link:

http://watleyreview.com/2005/062105-2.html

Jim, it's not even a joke. Thomas was right; the impact of Kelo will be felt disproportionately by the poor and powerless, just as eminent domain always has been.

Would anyone object to THIS application of _Kelo_?

I don't know about (1), but I have a two word answer for (2). Keg party.

This decision is really screwed up. You know that if Rhenquist of O'Connor retire this week, the whole public debate will be about 10 Commandments and Abortion. I take the Ted Kennedy position on any abortion bill ("pay it"), but come one, forest through the trees!! Even Grokster (a decision I predicted and supported) barely made news yesterday. When it comes to property issues, our press doesn't care.

Has everyone missed this portion of the decision??:

It is further argued [by the petitioners] that without a bright-line rule nothing would stop a city from transferring citizen A’s property to citizen B for the sole reason that citizen B will put the property to a more productive use and thus pay more taxes. Such a one-to-one transfer of property, executed outside the confines of an integrated development plan, is not presented in this case. While such an unusual exercise of government power would certainly raise a suspicion that a private purpose was afoot,17 the hypothetical cases posited by petitioners can be confronted if and when they arise.18 They do not warrant the crafting of an artificial restriction on the concept of public use.

The attack on altruism you perceive in the ruling is irrelevant. It was wrong whether the owners were selfish or generous. Our rights are not dependent on our rulers' approval of our exercise of them; to rule otherwise is tyranny.

"artificial restriction on the concept of public use."

BARF! What in the world is the entire Bill of Rights, if not "artificial" restrictions on the concept of government power. Bleah...

I'm buying one of these just to have around, although people who wear their heart upon their sleeves might prefer those.

This is just too "busy" for me.

Brett-

I agree 100% with your sentiments, although they contradict nothing I wrote.

I am, however, interested in enlarging the tent of Kelo opposition to include those who don't share my reverence for property rights. So I search for arguments with 'crossover' appeal even if that means it sounds like Kenny G.

Many of the folks who granted conservation easements received some "from govt" benefit as a consequence.

That should make it easier for govt to take the rest of the value.

but if we consider our money to be our property, then government has been taking it without just compensation, in the form of taxes, for many years.

I shall notify your nearest serve-and-protect officers and fire protection professionals of this development immediately. I wonder what those services will cost you on the open contract market, what with economies of scale and such, and the fact that the proprietors thereof will arrive at your house exclusively on toll roads.

I just started an informal pool in the back room - the Principles of Logical Reasoning are betting fifteen to one that your best outcome is break-even. Feel free to throw your own money into the hat, but just in case your vision of tax-free reality carries, bets are accepted only in the form of diamonds, gold bullion, and high-quality arms.

Ohhhhh! Mindles said "Kenny G"! I'm heading for the exit; no telling what mayhem will result when everyone realizes what he said.

The last time I posted on this subject, someone said I would probably change my tune if it was my home they wanted to take. I've thought about it. I would be upset. But...

What is at stake is the "difference" between the homeowner's valuation of a property and the applicable government's valuation of the same property.

That is, the government isn't taking someone's home, they're taking the difference in valuation.

I think this is the reason that eminent domain is still viable. The neighbors often don't stand up for the targeted property owners because they see that the owner's valuation is excessive. They do not believe that a property owner has a right to declare that his or her property has infinite value when their doing so is detrimental to the community.

Would I be upset? Probably. Would I have a right to be upset? It depends on whether the offer made to me was "fair". I don't think I get the right to decide on my own what constitutes "fair". The community decides what is "fair". In essence, what the court decided was that the offer made to Kelo was "fair".

Randy,

You got me thinking about a very important point for people like me in California. Prop 13 may gives cities and counties further incentive to uproot communities of long-standing residents, whose property tax bills have been capped by Prop 13. Sucks to be a long-term owner in CA post-Kelo.

Brad,

I think it is important to remember that in this country, the government represents the community. While the court cases do tend to be adversarial - some individual vs some government - the government side of the equation does roughly represent the community.

Would "a government" start taking property because they could get more taxes from someone else? Rephrase the question. Would "a community" start taking property from itself because it could get higher taxes from some other community? Eminent domain is the community, as represented by it's government, forcing an individual to sell his or her property at what the community feels to be a fair price. It is necessary. And if the community doesn't want it, they can stop it.

Randy, I think it is often entirely reasonable for someone to feel their home is worth more to them than an outside party would be willing to pay. A person's home has a sentimental value that you can't put a price on. To use an extreme example, if I refuse to sell my son's baby pictures to you for a dollar it doesn't mean I'm being unreasonable or obstructionist, it just means that I value them a lot more than anyone else could be expected to.

"They do not believe that a property owner has a right to declare that his or her property has infinite value when their doing so is detrimental to the community."

I think I shoud have this right, unless there are very strong reasons to override it. Allowing the community to decide what my personal possessions are worth just seems wrong to me.

Randy wrote:
I think it is important to remember that in this country, the government represents the community.

This statement is a noble sentiment, but not always true. Go and ask people on the south side of Chicago if the current city government represents their community, for example.

Would "a community" start taking property from itself because it could get higher taxes from some other community?

During the era of "Urban Renewal", city after city did exactly that. They took buildings occupied by poor people, often owned by poor people, for pennies on the dollar and demolished them to make way for something a small group of developers would make quite a lot of money building and operating. What's more, the pennies paid to the poor were from taxpayers nationwide, funneled through Washington, DC and sprayed back out to selected localities; "Urban Renewal" was a disaster for many communities from New York to Oakland.

Eminent domain is the community, as represented by it's government, forcing an individual to sell his or her property at what the community feels to be a fair price.

Sometimes that is true. I know of a city that built a freeway system right through residential neighborhoods by condemning hundreds of middle class dwellings, demolishing them and digging a big trench for the road. That freeway system is used by many members of the community every day, and so would fit Randy's model.

Sometimes it is not true. Scandals involving the abuse of eminent domain (sports stadiums, for example) that involve a few cronies in government and the development business are easy to find, if one wishes to look.

The notion that any government can take any property at any time for any reason makes a mockery of the 5th Amendment; the fig-leaf of "we don't really mean THAT" in _Kelo_ notwithstanding, this decision is a poor one.

Sean,

Re; "Allowing the community to decide what my personal possessions are worth just seems wrong to me."

Good point. But it isn't a "right or wrong" kind of thing. It's a "necessary" thing. We live in communities - to which there is a downside. The community doesn't need to decide what all of your personal things are worth because for the most part the community doesn't care. But so called "real" property is another matter. The community uses a variety of methods to ensure that real property is put to its most effective uses in the interest of the community - e.g., property taxes, eminent domain, zoning ordinances, and for that matter, the concept of private property. The truth is, few types of property are less "real" than land.

Ellipsis,

Re; "The notion that any government can take any property at any time for any reason makes a mockery of the 5th Amendment..."

The Constitution is part of the law, but it is not all of the law. The law is not and cannot be static. Interpretation and/or clarification is needed from time to time. Adaptability is very clearly designed into the Constitution.

But again, eminent domain is not about individuals and evil governments that want to crush them. It is about the competing interests of individuals and their own communities. The solution isn't perfect. But the alternatives are worse.

"But it isn't a "right or wrong" kind of thing. It's a "necessary" thing."

But that's the issue here - it isn't a necessary thing anymore, at least if my basic understanding of Kelo is correct. I can understand a need for a concept like eminent domain, but I don't think a government should be able to exercise it to transfer private property to third party commercial interests just because it is "better" for the community. Better does not equal necessary and, in my opinion, taking someone's property when it is not absolutely necessary is a right or wrong kind of thing.

Sean,

Re; Necessary. In the Kelo case, the local government, representing the local community, decided that it was "necessary" to acquire the property for economic development. Certainly economic development is a necessity for any community. I don't have the facts, so I don't know how I would have acted in their place. The court, presumably having at least some of the facts, gave them the benefit of the doubt.

Re; Taking someone's property. Again, they didn't take the property. They took the difference between the community's valuation of the property and the owner's valuation. I don't think this is a minor point. I can see that some would place a very high, if not infinite, value on their homes. But they're living in a dream world. They have a right to fair value as determined in accordance with community standards - nothing more.

"Brad, I think it is important to remember that in this country, the government represents the community."

And the bill of rights is intended to protect individuals from the community, darnit.

"And if the community doesn't want it, they can stop it."

Even stipulating the perfect representative government, I still maintain that 'the community' should stay out of personal property absent significant negative externalities (ie not community opportunity costs, which seem to be the new basis for eminent domain).

I don't particularly like your point about valuation. One of the principals of valuation is an arms-length voluntary transaction. If someone doesn't want to sell , there is no such thing.

Mindles,

Re; Significant negative externalities vs community opportunity costs.

Good point. But which category applies to a town that is dying due to a change in economic circumstances? The court said its up to the community, or perhaps the state, to decide. I agree.

Re; Valuation as a voluntary transaction.

Normally and ideally, yes. But an exercise of eminent domain is by definition an involuntary transaction for one of the parties. Still, compensation is required - which means that a valuation is required. The community's standards apply. That's the downside to living in a community. The good new is that there is an upside. Revealed preference - we live in communities.

I'm not sure discussion this is going anywhere, and Mindles' Bill of Rights comment just above summed up my thoughts on communities vs individuals pretty nicely. But I can't let this pass without comment:

Again, they didn't take the property. They took the difference between the community's valuation of the property and the owner's valuation.

I suspect the people who are no longer able to live in their homes would not agree. For many people there is a lot of emotion tied up in their homes, not to mention issues around neighbourhoods, friends, kids' schools, etc. If I was forced out of my home by the government, and someone tried to feed me a line of theoretical BS about how they didn't really take my house - it's all just a question of valuation? Let's just say it would not be well received.

Sean,

I agree that it is an emotional issue. Use of phrases like "taking people's homes" is useful rhetorically, but it isn't accurate.

Randy wrote:
The Constitution is part of the law, but it is not all of the law. The law is not and cannot be static. Interpretation and/or clarification is needed from time to time. Adaptability is very clearly designed into the Constitution.

Yes, and it is called "the Amendment process". That process doesn't involve the whims of a handful of people, even if they are wearing black robes.

Randy wrote to Sean:
Use of phrases like "taking people's homes" is useful rhetorically, but it isn't accurate.

Yes, it is accurate. The government is forcing people out of their homes for the benefit of other private groups. If the targets of this exercise resist, there are all manner of means that can be brought to bear on them, including lethal force.

I note that you have not responded to my detailed exposition on how the "community" may consist of a handful of politically connected individuals, or to the facts of Urban Renewal. Could you please do so now?

I think Thomas' dissent in Kelo, which takes a very good shot at discerning original meaning, runs diametrically opposed to Randy's interpretations. And FWIW I like Thomas' reading better.

In Thomas' view (if I interpreted it correctly), the power of emminent domain was not a grant of power, it was a necessary exceptional case in an otherwise broad prohibition -- i.e. the property right is fundamental, the government is only permitted to take it as a last resort (and that with fair compensation).

Moreover, it was to function as a transaction between the public, as an entity, and the property owner, as the other entity. The public was buying something for itself, meaning the public would subsequently have the full use of it. A courthouse or city hall is a public purchase. A city park is a public purchase. A public road is a public purchase.

A shopping mall in private hands is not a public purchase. And the ability to confiscate property for such a purpose is a wide open invitation for corruption, in addition to being a direct attack on the fundamental property right.

You can puff "community valuation" all day long, but in the end, all I hear is a tribe of Native Americans somewhere snickering at the irony.

Ellipsis,

Re; The "Amendment process".

There's also the legislative process and the Supreme Court. The Constitution lays out the power of the court to make such decisions - and they did.

Re; Taking people's homes.

They are being forced to sell. Its not a good thing for the people who are being forced to sell, but it is not the same as a taking. I think what you and several others are really saying is that you feel that the difference between taking and forced selling is unimportant. I think it is important. It is the difference between legal and illegal. To state that people's homes are being "taken" is to imply that the law has been violated by the government. This is not the case.

Re; Community and politically connected individuals.

Mindles made a similar point "...even stipulating a perfect representative government". Certainly we can stipulate no such thing. The evidence is clear that government is seldom if ever completely under the control of the governed. But this is by design. Once in office, elected officials have the power to make decisions. They don't need any further approval than having been elected. There is a certain ugliness in governing. Fighting wars, policing the streets, taxing the citizens, exercising eminent domain, etc. All of them piss somebody off - but they are all necessary. I did respond earlier when I said that the solution is not perfect - it is simply better than the alternatives that have been tried.

Anony-mouse,

Re; "...the ability to confiscate property for such a purpose is a wide open invitation for corruption, in addition to being a direct attack on the fundamental property right."

As part of their decision, the supreme court gave the state and local courts the opportunity to close said invitation to corruption. In other words, let the community decide. Is it inconceivable that economic development could be a good, even necessary, thing in many cases? Is it inconceivable that the community might want to exercise eminent domain for such a purpose.

It all comes back to the rights of the individual vs the rights of the community. Specifically, the right of an individual to declare that his or her property has infinite value vs the right of the community to promote economic development. The court said let the local communities decide. And again, I agree.

"Is it inconceivable that economic development could be a good, even necessary, thing in many cases? Is it inconceivable that the community might want to exercise eminent domain for such a purpose."

It is more than conceivable, it's inevitable, but that's exactly why we have individual rights. Randy I'm interested to know, although its an invitation to thread erosion - do you feel the community should decide whether a woman has the right to abort a child, or would you prefer this be a matter of protected individual rights?

And your comment goes beyond whether the state makes a law instead of jurisprudence, your saying let the community decide in each case. I could rephrase: do you feel the community should decide ad hoc whether a woman has the right to abort a child?

I don't think the community should decide on the highest and best use for my stuff, especially through some bureaucratic committee and certainly not with the hollow justification of tax revenue optimization. The court should define clear limitations on takings, as suggested by the 5th Amendment. Instead they expanded it to include opportunity costs as suggested above.

Otherwise we're all just hunting illegally in the King's woods again.

Incidentally, there is substantial evidence that an economy without strong property rights is unlikely to be a rapidly developing one. Ask Hernando de Soto or Tom Bethell.

Thanks to Mindles for raising the conservation angle of Kelo. As I posted in the Slate Fray (http://fray.slate.msn.com/?id=3936&m=14990061), this decision represents a threat to the market-oriented model of environmental protection. What good is it to encourage greens to put their money where their mouth is if a pro-development regime on the country commission can come along later to force the sale of set-aside land? If it’s all about politics anyway, then its cheaper to stick with the socialist approach. People who share this concern should raised this issue with The Nature Conservancy to shake them out of their complacency.

On the “they are taking our homes” front, upscale neighborhoods are safe due to political clout, while the poor have long been vulnerable to being declared “blighted.” But people like me who live in working-to-middle-class close-in suburbs facing strong development pressure have plenty of reason to worry. I’ve seen first hand what developers can do with nearby land, even in the face of a hostile community and a skeptical city council. Dollars to donuts, ten years from now, they will back to take my house. If they want to pay me actual replacement value plus moving costs and compensation for a longer commute, fine. But Kelo will give them an excuse to low-ball the offer and stick me with a loss.

Every homeowner in America should be demanding that their elected representatives outlaw the use of eminent domain for purely economic development purposes.

elgodosimp

Mindles,

I'll get to your abortion question in a minute, but first, it is strange to find myself on this side of the debate. Believe it or not, I am a huge supporter of property rights and believe that no other "rights" are possible or meaningful without them. So why am I supporting the court's decision? Because I think the majority opinion was the stronger argument and I liked the de-facto result. You say above that, "The court should define clear limitations on takings, as suggested by the 5th Amendment." I disagree. I think the state and local legislatures should - and that is exactly what the Supreme Court suggested. If the local communities choose not to do so, I have to assume it is because they want to use eminent domain for the purpose of economic development. Who am I to tell them they can't?

Now, do I feel the community should decide whether a woman has the right to abort a child? Yes, I do. I'm not saying that the community should decide that she must not abort. I'm saying that the community should decide one way or the other. Moral codes (and I'm not just talking about religion) are the glue that hold the community together. Revealed preference - there's a reason we live in communities. Community has great value - and is not to be taken for granted, or discarded lightly.

To relate this issue back to the issue of eminent domain, I think the local communities are the best place for both decisions - I guess because I have a hard time fitting the federal government into any concept of community. New York and Alabama are likely to decide both issues quite differently. They should be allowed to.

Randy:

They are being forced to sell. Its not a good thing for the people who are being forced to sell, but it is not the same as a taking...[snip]...To state that people's homes are being "taken" is to imply that the law has been violated by the government. This is not the case.

Report back to your Senior High School's Civics 101 course: The doctrine of emminent domain has long been known as "takings." It is "taking" because the owner did not consent to give up the property, and was forced to do so anyway. The requisite compensation is a limitation on the harm caused by the taking, but taking still occurred.

As part of their decision, the supreme court gave the state and local courts the opportunity to close said invitation to corruption. In other words, let the community decide.

The Supreme Court might well also decide to let the community decide whether to hold slaves, but that wouldn't make it a better reading of the constitution in its present form, nor just to the parties enslaved until the commnity decides (if ever) that it would prefer to ban such a thing.

Is it inconceivable that economic development could be a good, even necessary, thing in many cases? Is it inconceivable that the community might want to exercise eminent domain for such a purpose.

Is it inconceivable that the community might decide that your daughter's rights as an individual are trumped by the community's desire to increase the population of involuntary prostitutes? (And hey, let's throw a community benefit spin on it: We think this will be an economically efficacious means to reduce the number of sexually-motivated street rapes experienced of late...) I hope it IS inconceivable that anyone would try to implement such a thing and succeed, but I didn't need any different logic than you to get to that possibility.

It all comes back to the rights of the individual vs the rights of the community. Specifically, the right of an individual to declare that his or her property has infinite value vs the right of the community to promote economic development.

Kindly disabuse yourself of the notion that there is such a thing as a "community right." The constitution grants rights to individuals. The community is a sum of individuals, but an individual does not automatically forfeit basic rights -- including the property right -- by living in a community. Decisions made by the community (general governance, zoning ordinances, etc.) are essentially a means of remedying conflicts of individual rights. A person does not have the right or privilege to use their property in a way that infringes on the rights or privileges others. This can even be carried to outright limitations on property use -- "no, you cannot build a bar next to an elemntary school." But that is not directly extrapolable to a right to take the property of others except when a pressing public need dictates, and when the public has the use of the taking.

"Economic development" is far to vague a term to be trustworthy when assessing the existence of a pressing public need.

I also don't think "revealed preference" means what you think it means in the case of a community. First, there is the possibility that an individual predates the community, and the community then decided to show up. The fact that the community's interests (or changes therein) do not automatically trump the prior rights of the property owner is reflected in the widespread application of the "grandfather clause." Second, even in other cases, most people do not consent to live in communities because of an expectation that the community will someday turn on them.

Finally, your view that real property reduces to simple questions of economic worth is patently offensive, and provides evidence why economists are not popular at parties. Let me give an example:

My parents own a modest tri-level on a half-acre lot. They did not buy it to live in until a better offer came along; they bought it to dwell in, and have shaped it accordingly. In the course of a 25-year ownership, as funds became available, they first built an attached two-car garage (my dad, who is a very able handyman, did nearly all of the work for this). They have gradually replaced nearly all floor coverings with the highest-quality materials available on the market. They (i.e., my dad) spent an entire weekend converting two walls from paint-and-plaster to wallpaper. They (my dad, again) moved a restroom door to a different wall to make access more practical and improve the use of the family room in which the restroom located. They replaced most of the bedroom and family room furniture with built-to-fit furnishings custom crafted by my grandfather while he was still in the cabinetry business. They landscaped most of the yard and maintain spacious flower gardens. They replaced most of the light fixtures (and, in some cases, added new ones). Most recently, my dad invested weeks to put up a new gardening tool shed starting from raw materials, because none of the commerically-available options offered suitable dimensions.

At present, they are in an unincoporated portion of the county but it is highly likely that the city of Thornton, already less than a mile away, will eventually annex the subdivision they live in. And if the community were to ever decide that their home was less important than a Home Depot, you would be perfectly cool with that, as long as monetary compensation were proffered.

I suspect your real problem is that you're not yet old enough to have a clue...

Last time I looked. Or about the year 1925 rolled around; it was decided in some important Supreme Court Case that "local governments" weren't really written into our Constitution. Only the Feds. The States. And, "US" People. States then sprinkled fairy dust on some local entities; and gave them rights to exist as "local governments."

BUT STATES CAN ABORT THEIR YOUNG! Local governments can be crushed by the state. Just like that. So how come, suddenly, our supremes think the local guys are the best to judge? Where's the power given to these "local governments," people?

Also. Ever see cities divided? Here, in LA, it happens. Where local areas sometimes fall under the umbrella of the "county." And, sometimes under the cities, themselves. Just ask the fire and police departments! And, the school boards!

Truly even more bizarre, it's more expensive for the locals to get the cash necessary to bring big cases all the way up the ladder to ajudication by the Supreme's. Wait till local homeowners have to pay for all of this nonsense.

Anyway, exactly how did these nine justices "see" the local governments, anyway? It's not a constitutional entity. The ruling on Kelo must come with bottles of fairy dust.

Anony-mouse,

Re; Kindly disabuse yourself of the notion that there is such a thing as a "community right."

You are correct. But the truth is we have only such "rights" as we have the power, individually or collectively, to enforce. As individuals we have very little power. And the power we have comes primarily from the power of the community to which we belong. Unfortunately, the community exacts a price. This is necessary and an overall benefit - or we would not belong to communities. There's no such thing as a free lunch. Responsibility to the community is the price we pay to participate in the power and rights of the community. And we don't have to. There are plenty of places in the United States where eminent domain is not an issue - wide open spaces with not a soul for miles.

Sorry to cut and run folks, but I'm going to be on the road for the next few days. It's been fun. You've made me think - and that's why I come here. My thanks to all - and especially to the host of this site.

Well Randy, if you find the thread again before it disappears into the archives, contemplate this:

If the "price" the community can exact goes beyond local taxation, reasonable zoning ordinances, and the ability to take property when a pressing need dictates, to an essentially unconditional ability to abbrogate a property right couched in language of "economic development" at the enforcement of a court, you have kicked out the only real doorstop to a fascist or communist state.

Hope you enjoy living with the consequences, because your turn to pay the community's "price" will come -- probably at a point in your life when it is most difficult to comply. And your 'wide open tracts of land' comment was mere flippancy. To employ hyperbole again, you might just as well tell a drowning man that if only he had gone wading a few miles upstream, the water is shallower.

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