Free Republic

An American man who made coffee in his own home while nude is facing charges of indecent exposure. Eric Williamson, from Springfield, Virginia, was brewing coffee in his kitchen when a woman and a seven-year-old boy walked past the window and saw him. The woman complained to police who arrested Williamson shortly after the incident on Monday morning. Williamson, 29, insisted he did nothing wrong and that any exposure of his private parts were accidental. "Yes I wasn't wearing any clothes but I was alone, in my own home and just got out of bed. It was dark and I...

Weeds, glass, bricks, pieces of pipe and shingle splinters have replaced the knot of aging homes at the site of the nation's most notorious eminent domain project. But what of the promised building boom that was supposed to come wrapped and ribboned with up to 3,169 new jobs and $1.2 million a year in tax revenues? They are noticeably missing.

The majority upheld that the city of New London, Conn., could declare as urban blight the Kelo house and the well-kept neighborhood it was in so that the city could sell it to a developer who promised 3,169 new jobs and $1.2 million a year in tax revenues. Four years later? Nothing. The land the city stole [not legally stealing because Ruth Bader Ginsberg told them they could do it] truly is urban blight today, Katie Nelson of the Associated Press reported.

The murderous secular humanist religions of Communism and Nazism were spawned by the anti-God/utopian tradition of Revolutionary France. The Black Book of Communism, an 800- page compendium of the crimes of Communist regimes worldwide, graphically details the terror, torture, man-made famine, mass deportations, starvation, and massacres undertaken on behalf of revolutionary utopian ideals. The reality of Communism, which claimed to be an emissary of the Enlightenment, of universal brotherhood, and of happiness for all as envisioned by Gracchus Babeuf, turned out to be not only a sadistic engine for unimaginable evil but also the creator of hells on earth. The...

Jonestown resident Marlon Coplin lives on the north side of Lake Travis and enjoys his lakefront property. But he is being taken to court by the city of Cedar Park because the city wants eminent domain rights of his property. By September, an intake barge in planned on being built in order to supply water to Cedar Park... "Just the land itself is worth $800,000," said Coplin. "They're offering me $42,000." As it stands now, Coplin feels he's being cheated. "Some day I'd like to sell my property, and now I'm going to have to sell it 50 cents on...

Four years ago, on June 23, 2005, a 6-3 Supreme Court majority ruled in Kelo v. New London that the New London, Connecticut government could condemn houses in that city's Fort Trumbull area in the name of redevelopment. A bit over a year later, the city settled with the area's final two holdouts, the Cristofaro family and Susette Kelo. Since then the city has without success tried to engage a developer to build a hotel on part of the now-leveled area, and to put apartments or condos on the rest. Yes, you read that right; they're building residences where residences...

It is already known that Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor has used racist language to describe herself as more qualified than "white males." According to "Vote No on Sotomayor" (Wall Street Journal, July 24 2009, page A13), Sonia Sotomayor also, as a jurist on the Second Circuit, voted to sanction the moral and ethical equivalent of retail theft by price tag switching. This is strong language, but we invite our readers to tell us why it does not accurately describe the quoted material: Judge Sotomayor also revealed a troubling approach to property rights in Didden v. Village of...

Every now and then, even in Oregon, environmental activists and property rights advocates find themselves on the same side of the political fence. One of those politics-makes-strange-bedfellows issues has been brewing in the Oregon Legislature and may still find its way to the governor's desk if Senate strategists can get it to the floor for a vote. House Bill 3058, which passed the House a couple of weeks ago, would allow private companies seeking to construct "linear utility or transportation" facilities to apply for removal and fill permits for wetlands on other people's property. These companies already have the considerable...

How the Sotomayor nomination revived the debate over eminent domain abuse Property rights were probably the last thing on President Barack Obama's mind when he selected Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter. But that hasn't stopped Sotomayor's nomination from reigniting the long-simmering national debate over the use and abuse of eminent domain. The controversy centers on Sotomayor's vote in a 2006 eminent domain case, Didden v. Village of Port Chester. New York entrepreneur Bart Didden says Port Chester condemned his land after he refused to pay $800,000 (or grant a 50 percent stake in his...

Employing a rarely used provision of city code, Milwaukee officials are poised to take two commercial lots from one owner and then sell them to another developer who has made campaign contributions to a key alderman. If the land acquisition goes through, it will dash the dreams of Rafael Cetina, whose family bought the land in 2002 with visions of building a restaurant and club that would serve spicy Mayan flavors paying tribute to his heritage on the Yucatan Peninsula. The process of eminent domain is almost never used by the city to acquire commercial real estate. The last time...

http://standourground.org/2009/06/eminent-domain-or-theft-city-of-less-than-3000-people-condemns-235-acres-of-farmland-for-city-use/

SOMERSET, Pa. -- Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says the U.S. government will not use eminent domain to seize people's land for a permanent Flight 93 memorial and instead will renew negotiations with landowners near the terrorist crash site in Somerset County. U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., and Salazar met with families of victims and landowners on Friday in Shanksville to discuss issues surrounding the planned national memorial for victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, fatal hijacking. Specter's office said Friday's meeting also focused on what still needs to be done for the memorial to be complete in time for the...

Grassroots call for lawmakers to KILL loaded TxDOT sunset bill Trans Texas Corridor to proceed despite repeal of corridor (Austin, TX – May 28, 2009) The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) sunset bill, HB 300, now over 1,500 pages long, has too much baggage for taxpayers to swallow. HB 300 ends the private toll moratorium (which hands our PUBLIC highways to PRIVATE, foreign toll operators), keeps the Trans Texas Corridor (TTC) alive, opens a new loophole to toll existing freeways, allows counties a 10 cent gas tax hike, raids public employee pension funds to invest in risky private toll roads...

New York state senator Kevin Parker (D-Brooklyn) has not made payments on his $488,000 mortgage in over a year. The Senator declared it was not a matter of financial difficulty, but a matter of principle. “I am a duly elected representative of the people,” Parker pointed out. “The people’s representatives need accommodations appropriate to their status as members of the governing class. The bank’s interest in profiting from the loan must be subservient to this greater purpose.” Parker cited both “eminent domain” and “sovereign immunity” as the legal justification for his refusal to make payments. “Under eminent domain, the government...

Since the Supreme Court's notorious 2005 decision in Kelo v. City of New London, which allowed that municipality to seize private property on behalf of the Pfizer Corporation, 43 states have passed laws protecting property rights against Kelo-style eminent domain abuse. Mississippi is not one of those states. But that nearly changed in March 2009 when the Mississippi legislature voted overwhelmingly in support of a proposed law which would have guaranteed that "the right of eminent domain shall not be exercised for the purpose of taking or damaging privately owned real property for private development or for a private purpose;...

BISBEE — A recent court decision that held the Border Patrol liable for occupying private property in California might be applied to lands in other places near the U.S.-Mexico border, including Cochise County. Otay Mesa Property LP, Rancho Vista Del Mar and Otay International LLC filed a lawsuit in March 2006 seeking compensation for the use of 750 acres of valuable development land in San Diego County. Without permission from landowners, the Border Patrol buried numerous sensors, and then entered the property when the sensors indicated movement of potential illegal immigrants. On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims held...

PITTSBURGH – The government will begin taking land from seven property owners so that the Flight 93 memorial can be built in time for the 10th anniversary of the 2001 terrorist attacks, the National Park Service said. In a a statement obtained by The Associated Press, the park service said it had teamed up with a group representing the victims' families to work with landowners since before 2005 to acquire the land. "But with few exceptions, these negotiations have been unsuccessful," said the statement, which was to be released later Thursday. The seven property owners own about 500 acres still...

The Texas Senate voted Monday to expand the rights of property owners who face having their land taken by the government. The bill by Sen. Craig Estes, a Wichita Falls Republican, would limit eminent domain land takings to projects for public use only and would require governments to make a “bona fide” offer for the property before condemnation. A property owner would be entitled to be paid for any loss of market value if the taking impairs their access to the land they still have. Any land taking would also have to be done by a record vote in a...

Economic development can and has occurred regularly without the forced taking of a private citizen’s home or business. The “Private Property Rights Protection Act of 2009” H.R. 1885, assures investors that their property will not be auctioned off to the highest bidder in the name of the public good.

What is happening in the cradle of the modern civil rights movement? Jimmy McCall would like to know. 'It was more my dream house,' he laments, 'and the city tore it down ... It reminds me of how they used to mistreat black people in the Old South.' In 1955, Rosa Parks took on the whole system of Jim Crow by refusing to give up her seat on a segregated Montgomery bus. Today, McCall is waging a lonely battle against the same city government for another civil right: the freedom to build a home on his own land. Though McCall's...

A Maryland Senate budget panel approved a bill Thursday that will give Gov. Martin O'Malley the authority to assert eminent domain in an effort to keep horse racing's Preakness Stakes in Baltimore. The Senate Budget and Taxation Committee voted 11-4 in favor of the legislation, which will allow the state to either purchase or exercise eminent domain over the rights to the Preakness and the race track on which it is run, the Pimlico Race Course. The bill would also extend the state's eminent domain authority over Laurel Park and the Bowie Race Course Training Center. Mr. O'Malley, a Democrat,...

Governor Markell Set to Sign Senate Bill 7 WEB RELEASE: April 3, 2009 CONTACT: Bob Ewing (703) 682-9320 Arlington, Va.—For the second time in as many years, the Delaware legislature has passed historic eminent domain reform. Both houses of the Delaware legislature voted unanimously to approve S.B. 7, which will protect homes, small businesses, farms and houses of worship from the abuse of eminent domain for private profit. The legislation heads to Governor Jack Markell, who has said he would sign the bill. “Delaware just shot to the head of the class,” said Steven Anderson, an attorney at the Institute...

I have been hearing rumors that Hr 169 would allow Obama to grant eminent domain powers to China, that effectively we have just given them the power to forclose on us and take everything away if they desire. If this is true, then in 3 years USA will belong to Peoples republic of China. Can anyone verify this?

Here's one genuinely welcome casualty of the Bush-Obama recession. Gothamist brings word that Brooklyn's Atlantic Yards project is floundering: Starchitect Frank Gehry really stepped in it during a recent interview with industry journal The Architect's Newspaper, admitting he doesn't think developer Bruce Ratner's $4.2 billion plan to build a Nets basketball arena, office towers and thousands of apartments in Brooklyn will become a reality. In an interview on the occasion of his 80th birthday, Gehry dropped the bombshell when asked about unrealized commissions he most wishes had been built: "The Corcoran Gallery in DC, the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn—I...

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property...

Ebensburg, Pa. (AP) -- A western Pennsylvania Amish farmer was sentenced Tuesday to 90 days in jail after refusing to bring a pair of outhouses into compliance with state sewage laws. Andy Swartzentruber, of Ebensburg, cited his conservative religious beliefs in refusing to abide by a court order to make the privies used by schoolchildren compliant and pay a $500 fine. Cambria County Judge Norman Krumenacker said he respected the Amish's religious beliefs but had no choice but to sentence Swartzentruber to jail and fine him $1,000 for being in contempt of court. "Quite frankly, this is not a religious...

http://www.marketskeptics.com/2009/01/hyperinflation-will-begin-in-china-and.html The conventional wisdom on China is dead wrong. Specifically, there is a widespread belief, as expressed by Goldman Sachs, that "China will keep the yuan trading within a narrow range in 2009 due concerns about exporters." Worse still, others are even predicting that China will devalue its currency! The sheer wishful thinking is astounding! The idea that "China will keep the dollar peg to help its exporters" ranks all the way up there with "Housing prices always go up" and "You can spend your way to prosperity".

The Chinese, who hold a humongous chunk of the U.S. government's national debt, are getting nervous about America's economic prospects -and they're right to be jittery- so they're demanding security. "We have lent a huge amount of money to the U.S., so of course we are concerned about the safety of our assets. Frankly speaking, I do have some worries," the Wall Street Journal quotes Premier Wen Jiabao saying. The premier called on the U.S. to "maintain its credibility, honor its commitments and guarantee the security of Chinese assets." Short of registering a lien against the whole country, it's unclear...

<p>This seems too outlandish to be true, but news source appears legitimate.</p> <p>"The time for partisan bickering just ended. This is as serious as a heart attack. Obama is going to spend so much money, which he intends to get from China via the sale of government backed bonds, that the Chinese apparently don't think he'll be able to make good on them.</p>

"Dale Henderson, a prominent Maine landowner who owns two pieces of land that the new trail runs through, is challenging the state over ownership of parts of the new Sunrise Trail. About 50 miles of the project recently was opened to hikers, bikers, cross-country skiers, snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles. But Henderson isn’t waiting for the courts to decide his fate. He already has taken matters into his own hands. The landowner recently erected barricades to stop users from traversing his property. In the town of Hancock, Henderson put up a berm on the tracks at one end and a stone...

You may think you know all the intrigue and drama of Susette Kelo’s story. But be prepared to be outraged anew with the release of Little Pink House: A True Story of Defiance and Courage (Grand Central Publishing, January 26, 2009, $26.99), a first-rate nonfiction drama told by award-winning author Jeff Benedict. Benedict’s work takes readers behind the scenes—showcasing Kelo’s fight to save her home and New London Development Corporation President Claire Gaudiani’s effort to take it away. Little Pink House will rightfully transform Kelo from a hero in the fight for property rights into a popular legend in the...

Takings cases linger Appeals opinion could cost $15M By TIMOTHY O'HARA AND ROB BUSWEILER Citizen Staff Monroe County may have to spend at least $15 million to buy nearly a dozen pieces of Florida Keys properties because the government's land-use regulations rendered them undevelopable, according to a court opinion issued Wednesday. The 3rd District Court of Appeals decision overturns two property-rights cases, one that favored Monroe County and one that favored the city of Marathon, both rendered by 16th Judicial Circuit Judge David Audlin. In the former, Audlin ruled against Thomas Collins and 10 other property owners who sued the...

Harvard professor says it's time for the Treasury to use eminent domain. Democrats are clear about this much: They believe the banks and the Bush administration have done too little to halt home foreclosures and they intend to do more. The source of the funds is clear too. House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., has warned Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson that Congress won't release the last $350 billion of the $700 billion "Troubled Asset Relief Program" to the Treasury until there's an agreement some of the funds will be used to reduce the estimated 4 to 5 million foreclosures...

It has been more than seven years since 20-year-old Deora Bodley and 39 other passengers and crew died in the fiery crash of United Airlines Flight 93, their hijacked plane disintegrating in a grove of hemlock trees outside Shanksville, Pa. Most of the remains from the tragedy on Sept. 11, 2001, were never recovered, making the bowl-shaped crash site in the western Pennsylvania countryside an unofficial cemetery and, for surviving relatives, sacred ground. But efforts to buy property for a national Flight 93 memorial have bogged down in federal red tape and a protracted land dispute, angering family members and...

El Paso County filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court this week in the latest bid to stop construction of hundreds of miles of border fence. The 34-page appeal argues that U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff overstepped his legal authority when he waived 37 federal laws that could have slowed or blocked construction of fencing along the border. Congress authorized the fence to help secure the border and slow illegal immigration. In asking the court to review a lawsuit previously dismissed by a federal court judge in El Paso, lawyers for the county also contend that Chertoff violated...

After a bitter five-year legal fight, the city of Long Branch has suggested it will abandon its plan to seize more than a dozen modest homes to make way for an ambitious oceanfront development project. Mayor Adam Schneider, who has long contended the small neighborhood meets the "blighted" designation necessary for the use of eminent domain, said today he now wants to settle with the homeowners rather than fight them in court for several more years. "The goal is to not use eminent domain," Schneider said. "I want this case settled. It's not going to settle if we use eminent...

...So YOU thought KELO was abusive...??? KLEPTOCRACY 201 - Today's Lesson Today, class, we will learn how to exercise 'eminent domain' without that pesky need to pay the owner ANYTHING for the property... ...and using this new method, you can not only strong-arm the property away from its rightful owner, but you STILL get to keep shaking down the "property owner" for all those great  PROPERTY TAXES on the parcel, AS WELL! ...WHAT could be BETTER than THAT???!!! ...It's a Kleptocrat's DREAM!!!

LAS VEGAS -- A record number of Nevada voters approved one of the most controversial ballot questions was approved Tuesday. Question No. 2. dealt with the restriction of eminent domain. Under the new law, state and city governments can only take possession of private land for real public use, such as roads and schools -- not casinos. If the government did gain control of someone's property, then the person losing his or her property must get the highest price that property would bring on the open market, the proposal said. It would also allow landowners to go to court to...

    U.S. Set to Take Coloradans Land Without Compensation    By Fred Kelly Grant October 24, 2008              At this very hour, Colorado landowners are fighting to prevent the United States federal government from taking their land.  Ignored by the mass media, hundreds of farmers and ranchers in southeastern Colorado are facing loss of their property at the hands of the IRS.  They are victims of “conservation easements” promoted by federal and state governments, land trust companies, and conservation groups.    As landowners dedicated to preserving the open, agricultural use of their land, lured into the “easements” by both the...

BISMARCK – Recently, the Burleigh County Commission discussed the proposed updates to the Burleigh County Comprehensive Plan. Commission Chairman Jerry Woodcox was quoted in the Bismarck Tribune, saying "Any kind of a plan, if it's a good plan and a progressive plan is going to take some property rights, but that's part of our job - to channel evolvement, to get a good development, to have it proper and do it right.” Taking people’s property rights requires a couple of big assumptions. First, the denial that people have a right to use their personal property as they see fit so...

The federal law authorizing the Flight 93 National Memorial has been changed to allow the federal government to use eminent domain proceedings to obtain the 275-acre Svonavec Inc. property. Patrick White, vice president of The Families of Flight 93 and buyers agent for the Families, said on Wednesday that the Justice Department would be the one to file for condemnation and will make the decision if and when to do so. It is not the Families of Flight 93’s decision, he said. “The time has come for the residents and citizens of Somerset County to understand what the law is...

Forest City Ratner's $4 billion Atlantic Yards development project will be delayed by an additional six months or more in the wake of a ruling by a state Appellate Court. The court rejected a motion put forth by the Empire State Development Corp. to dismiss the lawsuit filed by nine property owners in the footprint of the project challenging the use of eminent domain. The ruling has forced the developer, Bruce Ratner, to reverse a pledge that ground for the project would be broken by the end of the year. "While the Appellate Division Second Department's decision to hear the...

Settlement is in sight on a 9-year-old court battle over land on which Wasilla's Multi-Use Sports Complex is built. Anchorage Superior Court Judge Peter Michalski on Monday signed an order giving developer Gary Lundgren $314,739 in attorney fees and court costs in an eminent domain case the city filed against Lundgren's land in December 2002. In eminent domain cases, the plaintiff typically pays the defendants' court fees.

Texas oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens is about to make a killing by selling water he doesn’t own. As he does it, it will be praised as a planet-friendly wind project. The basic story amounts to this: Pickens, thanks to favors from state lawmakers whose campaigns he funded, has created a new government whose only voters are two of his employers; this has empowered Pickens to more cheaply pump water from an aquifer and, by use of eminent domain, seize land across 11 counties in order to pipe the water to Dallas. To win environmentalist approval of this hardly “sustainable”...

BEIJING — Two elderly Chinese women have been sentenced to a year of “re-education through labor” after they repeatedly sought a permit to demonstrate in one of the official Olympic protest areas, according to family members and human rights advocates. The women, Wu Dianyuan, 79, and Wang Xiuying, 77, had made five visits to the police this month in an effort to obtain permission to protest what they contended was inadequate compensation for the demolition of their homes in Beijing. During their final visit on Monday, Public Security officials informed them that they had been given administrative sentences for “disturbing...

When one lives in New Jersey, one sets one's expectations accordingly. We are a people, after all, whose two pro football teams still call themselves "New York." Whose governor responded to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by appointing a man he later said was his lover to be the state's adviser for homeland security. Whose most famous mayor -- Jersey City's Frank Hague -- left office more than 60 years ago but is still remembered for having a special desk drawer he could push out like a bank teller, the easier for those sitting before him to deposit their...

Due to Restrictions can only post link. Residents want city gas drilling permits stopped

Mortgage Bailout Bill Funds Eminent Domain President Bush just signed another taxpayer-funded piece of constitutionally challenged legislation to bail out 400,000 home buyers who face forclosure in the failing Bush economy. The government’s latest intrusion into market issues, the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, may have far-reaching ill effects on private property, however. Among other provisions, “it creates a new regulator for ailing mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and establishes a $300 billion program to expand the Federal Housing Administration’s ability to guarantee mortgages.” And, writes John Berlau, “of all the unintended consequences of the housing...

A county that originally paid $2 million for a tract of land it had seized to construct a park has been found guilty by a jury of greatly undervaluing the property and has been ordered to pay up to an additional $19.25 million to the developer the county seized it from. The jury decided unanimously that York County, Penn., should have paid developer Peter Alecxih Jr. a total of $17.25 million for land it took as part of an eminent domain seizure in 2004. With interest of up to $4 million, the $21.25 million price tag for the Highpoint parcel...

Jury to York County: Highpoint land worth $17.25 million A York jury awards a Lancaster developer an additional $10 million for his former property. Daily Record/Sunday News Article Last Updated: 07/17/2008 07:35:36 AM EDT LATEST TRIAL UPDATES 3:33 p.m. -- Jury returns with a verdict. The jury decided the county should have paid a Lancaster developer $17.25 million as fair market value for his Lower Windsor Township land, when it seized it for a park. Peter Alecxih has received $7.5 million for the land so far. County solicitor Mike Flannelly said the county has 30 days to appeal, and it...