Posted on 08/15/2005 10:32:50 AM PDT by neverdem
WHEN THE Supreme Court decided seven weeks ago in Kelo vs. New London to loosen constitutional restraints on local governments taking your house and selling it to Wal-Mart, it triggered a wave of public revulsion from New England to South Los Angeles. Ninety-three percent of Granite State residents in a University of New Hampshire poll opposed using eminent domain for private development. Legislators in 28 states have made at least preliminary noises about restricting the practice, with Alabama being first to enact a new law.
State Sen. Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks) has introduced a ballot initiative to, according to his website, "prohibit the [government] seizure of one person's property for the private gain of another." Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) cosponsored a successful amendment to stop federal Community Development Block Grants from going to any locale that doesn't prohibit eminent domain seizures for private development.
"It's like undermining motherhood and apple pie," Waters told the San Francisco Chronicle. "I mean, people's homes and their land — it's very important, and it should be protected by government, not taken for somebody else's private use."
Yet Waters' folksy wisdom about Kelo proved too simple by half for some of her fellow liberal activists and Democratic politicians, who see the backlash as either a sneaky Republican plot or a prophylactic separating potential tax dollars from their grubbing hands.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) opposed Waters' amendment, arguing that the Supreme Court decision "is almost as if God has spoken." The New York Times editorial page, virtually alone among the country's newspapers, hailed the decision as "a welcome vindication of cities' ability to act in the public interest" and "a setback to the 'property rights' movement, which is trying to block government from imposing reasonable zoning and environmental regulations."
Locally, pols reveal...
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Not to advocate violence, but if some slack-jawed politico tries to seize my home, I don't see why they should get to enjoy THEIR HOME!
I hear that. Any government official who tries to seize my property had better be a good shot and sleep with one eye open.
"who see the backlash as either a sneaky Republican plot"
What Republicans? Where? The Corporate Conservatives are on board with the Corporate Liberals on this one. Bipartisan unity. The constitution was a barrier to increasing profits so it was defined away.
Alabama wasn't first (maybe after the fact)....Georgia had the protection in place prior to the US Supreme Court ruling....
The Georgia State constitution requires the protection and has been tested and upheld by the Georgia Supreme Court.
NeverGore
Liberal Redevelopment of privately owned home sites and land by pre-eminent domain rulings: Elegant Communes and Orgy Cafes for AIDS/HIV infected homosexuals who are persecuted throughout the world and who are welcomed "social" refugees to America.
What about heterosexual lepers???
"What about heterosexual lepers???"
I beleive leper colonies are no more...they have condo projects on them now.
:]
That hotel on Souter's property for example will create wealth and jobs for government-subsidized "cheap" migrant labor (yet another simple fact of economics). It's pure capitalism.
Though there is no right to a job this is little different than the simple matter of corporations' right to send every blue-collar and techie job offshore. It's best for business and free enterprise. It's capitalism. It creates wealth for the corporations and without corporations there'd be no jobs..er, I mean. . . . Never mind.
There are other jobs to be gotten and other property to own.
Both take something from U.S. citizens. At least the property owner is suppose to get a fair price.
This woman is pure scum and evil. What a lame low-life. How can people be so stupid to elect her?
ping!
Please FReepmail me if you want on or off my ‘miscellaneous’ ping list.
The only problem is that the left will say increasing the tax base is not a "private gain".
It has to exempt "Taxation as a gain".
one word.....KA-BOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!!
Good to know about Georgia. I think the article was implying Alabama was the first after the ruling.
Hard to believe I agree with Maxine Waters about much of anything.
It's scary when Maxine Waters is the voice of reason!
What happens when an average house on prime property is
coveted by another who will assure the city that they will
erect a 6 bedroom, 5 bathroom house... thus increasing
property value and hence the tax base.
Developers gain to be sure, but because government gains
it is allowed to happen.
Property rights are fundamental to freedom and thus are Constitutionally protected.
A job is obviously not.
If you are serious (which I doubt), read Milton Freedman's "Capitalism and Freedom".
M
Carolyn
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