6.24.2005

The Supremes and Your House

Xavier at Pibb Show tackles a subject I have not: yesterday's truly horrendous decision in the New London case that any municipality at any time can seize private property and hand it over to a developer. In the past when this was used, there usually had to be a clear and compelling public interest for taking land. But in the Supremes ruling yesterday, there didn't seem to be much of a standard required which means - at least in theory - that all you need to do is have a municipal official in your pocket if you want to grab somebody else's property.

Let's cut to Xavier but I encourage you to read his whole post:

Given the cozy relationships between corporations, developers and city governments, it wouldn't appear to take much "leaning" to get a city to do a major company's bidding - after all, that already happens now. As the homeowners' petition stated, if the Supreme Court ruled in their favor, the sky would not fall. But if the Court ruled in favor of New London, the floodgates would open. Maybe that lady in Atlantic City whose home is surrounded by one of Donald Trump's casinos should start packing. Tonight.