By: dlw

dlw — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Average americans tend to have a very poor understanding of constitutional law.

If you read the actual disposition then you see that some very specific reasons were given to justify the taking in light of a public purpose.

It is impossible for every "taking" to mandate compensation without completely impairing the police-role of the gov't.

I would suggest that you do some more homework before jumping on a populist bandwagon on issues that are outside of your intellectual purview.

Besides what is at stake here is the inviolability of ownership of land and that has historically been a difficult moral question. Here are some quotes from famous thinkers on the matter taken from a Henry George website.

John Locke said that "God gave the world in common to all mankind…. When the 'sacredness' of property is talked of, it should be remembered that any such sacredness does not belong in the same degree to landed property." William Blackstone wrote: "The earth, and all things therein, are the general property of all man-kind, from the immediate gift of the Creator." Thomas Paine stated that "men did not make the earth… It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property." According to Thomas Jefferson, "The earth is given as a common stock for men to labor and live on."

John Stuart Mill wrote: "The increase in the value of land, arising as it does from the efforts of an entire community, should belong to the community and not to the individual who might hold title." Abraham Lincoln said: "The land, the earth God gave to man for his home, sustenance, and support, should never be the possession of any man, corporation, society, or unfriendly government, any more than the air or water, if as much." In the words of Herbert Spencer, "equity does not permit property in land … The world is God's bequest to mankind. All men are joint heirs to it."

long and short, our legal rights of property ownership of land are not sacrosanct and may be revoked if it serves a justified public purpose.

dlw

By: Funky Dung

Funky Dung — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

"long and short, our legal rights of property ownership of land are not sacrosanct and may be revoked if it serves a justified public purpose"

In principle, I agree with you. However, I question whether taking homes and small businesses away to give land to a shopping center is justified. I also dispute that such a taking and giving is really a "public purpose". By such a loose definition, a lot of undesireable things could be done by a government in the name of private interests under the guise of public purpose.

By: dlw

dlw — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Well it was judged by the appropriate local legislative authorities to be such and the court exercised the correct practice of judicial deference.

So if you want to second guess such a legislative determination, that is fine, but don't raise a bloody banner over the courts undermining all property by permitting a taking without compensation.

dlw

Comments on: Life, Liberty, and Property

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