Kelo vs New London

In a Supreme Court ruling today, which leaves my head spinning and with expectations that the Rapture is now imminent, I side with Justices Thomas, Scalia, and Rehnquist who dissented from the majority opinion.

The case was Kelo vs. New London (Connecticut) in which residents in the town of New London fought the city government’s attempts to seize their private property/homes, under rights of eminent domain, to establish an office, residential, and retail complex to support a nearby Pfizer pharmaceutical research facility.

Sandra Day O’Connor, who also dissented, said:

"Today the Court abandons this long-held, basic limitation on government power,” she wrote. “Under the banner of economic development, all private property is now vulnerable to being taken and transferred to another private owner, so long as it might be upgraded—i.e., given to an owner who will use it in a way that the legislature deems more beneficial to the public—in the process."

The effect of the decision, O’Connor said, “is to wash out any distinction between private and public use of property—and thereby effectively to delete the words “for public use” from the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment."

In other words, if you own a piece of property that someone else, with a lot more money and influence, can develop so that local government can realize increased tax revenues, you are fair game. It’s about as simple as that.

I wonder at the effect that may have in my area where there are several older small homes in the beach front area where developers have long wanted to bulldoze and move in. If you don’t have boodles of money and the town council is receptive to a development idea, I think you’re pretty much screwed now.