Starring Brooke Shields. No, really.

All that trouble for nothing: New London May Build Townhouses on Site of Kelo Takings

The property all the hubbub was about is still vacant. And empty. People lost their homes for nothing. Bad case law established for nothing. City spent $78M for nothing. More at the WSJ.

In the aftermath of the Kelo ruling, it looks like the city council has voted to evict: City officials voted Monday night to evict residents who refused to leave their riverfront homes, signaling that the end is near in an eminent domain dispute that reached the U.S. Supreme Court. The City Council approved the action […]

Seems to be mostly immaterial: Why has the Kelo backlash largely failed? Sandefur blames the political power of development interests who benefit from private-to-private condemnations and the lack of a strong philosophical commitment to property rights. Via Fun Bob.

Some good news: In a rare display of unanimity that cuts across partisan and geographic lines, lawmakers in virtually every statehouse across the country are advancing bills and constitutional amendments to limit use of the government’s power of eminent domain to seize private property for economic development purposes. The measures are in direct response to […]

The mayor has proposed one: Under a plan presented to the City Council Monday night, four people whose homes were seized for a private development would be allowed to stay. The city would own their properties and the residents would have to pay the city to live there. Doesn’t this sort of prove that the […]

ABC reports that 40 states and Congress are looking at eminent domain in a post Kelo world: Echoes of the debate are happening across the country, after a U.S. Supreme Court decision brought new attention to governments’ ability to seize property through the tool of eminent domain. Some 40 states are re-examining their laws with […]

Positive Liberty’s Timothy Sandefur notes that the backlash of Kelo hasn’t accomplished much so far: In the months after the Kelo decision was announced there was much talk of a “backlash” in the states. Since state law can provide greater protections to people than federal law does, people hoped to change state law to protect […]

No bulldozers, no evictions. The residents are still there. And quite confident they’ll stay: Even though the holdouts lost their case, and the development that would displace them finally seems free to go forward, construction has not begun, and some elements of the project have been effectively paralyzed since the court ruling prompted a political […]

BizzyBlog has a run down of recent events. Most recently: After a campaign focusing on rising taxes and the eminent domain controversy, New London voters have sliced the Democrats’ City Council majority from three to one. The upstart One New London Party won two council seats, losing a third seat by only 19 votes. The […]

The Kelo story gets a bit more interesting: The city council has voted to sever ties with the quasi-public development authority at the center of a national debate over eminent domain powers. The council voted 6-0 Monday night to revoke the designation of the New London Development Corp. as the city’s “implementing agency” for its […]

Ravenwood notes a particularly fishy case in New Jersey: Segal said he met with Cryan, who is head of the township’s Democratic Party, and other local officials “scores of times” over the past five years to discuss the project. He claims the talks turned adversarial after he rejected proposals to work with various developers they […]

A few interesting eminent domain issues since the Kelo decision: First, heh. Bubba (sorry, but R. Neal doesn’t quite roll off the keyboard yet) details some of TVA’s eminent domain dealings past and present: As part of the great Rural Electrification of the 1930s under FDR, the Tennessee Valley Authority was founded to control flooding, […]

Rep. Campfield has a piece in the local newspaper regarding protections from eminent domain abuse.

The Castle Coalition will keep you up to date on the eminent domain fight with their Hands Off My Home Campaign.

Via Blake, we learn that the state of Connecticut is stepping in to stop eminent domain seizures: “We need to let the public know we will address the Supreme Court ruling in a way that will produce legislation that ensures fairness and balance,” state Senate president pro tem Donald E. Williams Jr. said in a […]

Ford flip-flops on Kelo. Good. In other news, I heard on the radio that a local rep is looking to pass a law that states when a government takes land in an eminent domain case, that the local government should pay three times the market value of that land. Excellent!

The House passed a bill that would deny federal funds to any city or state project that used eminent domain to force people to sell their property to make way for a profit-making project such as a hotel or mall.. At the bottom of the article is this: In the roll call on the House […]

Radley rounds up cities pouncing on the Kelo decision and snatching up the primo property. Of note: Memphis, Tenn. — The Riverfront Development Corp. is planning a massive, 5-mile development effort, including the use of eminent domain to claim a four-block section from the current owners for a mixed-use development. “[Kelo] definitely gives the city […]

I had hoped that, if nothing else, Kelo would serve as a wake up call to everyone regarding just how too-big-for-their-britches the .gov had become. It seems some are getting the message. However, some are pouncing: Ravenwood reports that Freeport is already drawing up papers and going shopping and that DC is too. Radley has […]

I think, instead of sending lawyers, guns and money; someone needs to head to New London with a truckload of spotted owls, snail darters, and bald eagles . Once you turn them loose, all construction there would stop immediately. Thoughts?

Some reflections, reactions and fall out. I went home last night, finished off a bottle of Scotch and had a few beers. I sat in my backyard on my comfortable 0.6 acres in the country, looked at my fence (which is only symbolic at this point), looked at Junior’s play-set, looked at the 12 neighbors’ […]

Update: Today, I am ashamed of my country, my government, and the legal system (we don’t have a justice system). This is some scary stuff, folks. Freedom died a bit more. I honestly went to the parking lot, sat in the car and wiped tears from my eyes. Anger turned to sadness. Property rights (like […]

The Star-Telegram notes that the SCOTUS may be leaning toward the city: The justices — two were absent — seemed reluctant to stop local governments from taking private property and then turning it over to other private property owners for development. Because the new development will pay more taxes and perhaps create jobs, the reasoning […]

Lobbygow, in All Your Home Are Belong to Us, notes: In other words, “The Old Boy Network can do what they damned well please with regards to anybody’s property.” This moral sleight of hand involves a bit of misdirection by pointing out that the seized properties are paid for after all. So fucking what? A […]

Kevin notes that things are not going well for the plaintiffs. ScotusBlog notes: Marty reports that, based on the impression left by the oral arguments, the government-side is going to win today’s property rights cases overwhelmingly. In Kelo, the plaintiffs may get as many as three votes: Scalia; Thomas (who did not ask any questions); […]

Today, the Supreme Court will hear the case of Kelo v. New London, which is arguably the most important property rights case in recent years. The Post Gazette has two articles on the issue. The first notes: It has been 50 years since the U.S. Supreme Court adopted an expansive view of the power of […]

Good read at CNSNews on the tyranny of eminent domain and how the Kelo case will determine the future of property rights in America: The seizures and transfers, the government says, are in “the public interest” — because they will lead to more jobs for New London residents and more tax dollars for the government. […]

With five days to go before the Supreme Court hears what is arguably the most important property rights case in recent history, it’s worth noting that over 30 municipalities filed friend of the court briefs in support of taking private property from owners to turn over to private developers.