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Jewish World Review June 30, 2005 / 23 Sivan, 5765 Your home can be Pfizer's castle By Debra J. Saunders
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Americans who want to keep government out of the bedroom,
beware. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision that makes it
too easy for the government to seize your bedroom — and kitchen, parlor and
dining room — then hand your precious home over to a corporation.
The Fifth Amendment stipulates, "... nor shall private property
be taken for public use, without just compensation." Lawyers call it the
Takings Clause.
In its decision, the Supreme Court expanded the concept of
"public use" to apply it not to a highway, or school, or railroad, but to
economic development sanctioned by a government entity.
The city of New London, Conn., found itself in economic
doldrums. Redevelopment was supposed to be the bromide. State and local
officials created the New London Development Corp. That unelected entity
decided to increase tax revenues by pushing middle-class families out of
their waterfront homes and using eminent domain — the other E.D. — to make
way for a revitalization project, anchored around a Pfizer Inc. research
facility.
Some families in the redevelopment area agreed to be bought out.
Susette Kelo and Wilhelmina Dery, who was born in her home in 1918, were
among those New Londoners who balked.
The city didn't contend there was any blight in the neighborhood
to warrant government action. Why should they move out because Pfizer wanted
in? In a 5-4 ruling on Kelo written by Justice John Paul Stevens, the Big
Bench answered the why question: Because the government says so.
Connecticut law says economic development constitutes "public
use." And that's that. If states want to write laws that stipulate
otherwise, they can do so. But don't expect America's top court to hold
land-use commissions to the same standards they save for police.
As Justice Clarence Thomas quipped in a sharply worded dissent,
"Though citizens are safe from the government in their homes, the homes
themselves are not."
Another dissenter, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, noted that if
governments can kick people out of their homes under the banner of economic
development, "the specter of condemnation hangs over all property. Nothing
is to prevent the state from replacing any Motel 6 with a Ritz-Carlton, any
home with a shopping mall, or any farm with a factory."
Thomas noted that when governments seize homes to enrich their
own coffers, the poor and the black are likely to lose their homes.
"It's desperately hard to believe that in this country you can
lose your home to private developers," New London homeowner Bill Von Winkle
told The New York Times after the ruling. "It's basically corporate theft."
But it's corporate theft that will enrich New London, so Von Winkle's home
could become Pfizer's castle.
The libertarian-learning Institute of Justice, which represented
Kelo, Von Winkle and their neighbors, held a press conference Wednesday to
announce a new effort to fight back, as it champions the thousands of
homeowners it believes are the targets of overreaching eminent domain. The
campaign's name: Hands Off My Home.
The Institute for Justice is well aware of the fact that both
liberals and conservatives are appalled at the Kelo v. New London ruling.
San Francisco Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi told me he was "fearful of" the
ruling, as it may adversely affect "people who are not able to defend
themselves." Meanwhile, Thomas' dissenting opinion addresses the inequities
of a policy that falls hardest on "the least politically powerful'' — that
is, owners of lower-end homes.
Institute for Justice attorney Dana Berliner argued that New
London could have had its development project and still accommodated the
homeowners.
New London, she noted, "doesn't need these homes." But the New
London Development Corp. didn't want these older homes in its tony project.
So the homes must go.
On July 5, protesters will ask the New London City Council to
spare the homes of Kelo, Dery and their co-litigants. New London should
comply. Why? The New London Development Corp. wants to seize these homes for
the worst reason of all: because it can.
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Comment JWR contributor Debra J. Saunders's column by clicking here. © 2005, Creators Syndicate |
Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||
