United Liberty

On June 23, 2005, the United State Supreme Court dealt a fatal blow to private property rights with the decision issued in Kelo v. New London. This landmark ruling allows state and local governments to use the previously redefined meaning of “public use” from the Fifth Amendment (also known as the Takings Clause) to use eminent domain to essentially steal property from one private entity and transfer it to another.

In case you’re not familiar with Kelo, here is some background. The City of New London, Connecticut sought to redevelop the Fort Trumbull neighborhood in hopes of increasing the city’s tax base (“economic development”). Several property owners refused to sell to the city, including Susette Kelo, and condemnation proceedings were started by New London Development Corporation, a private body acting on behalf of the city. Ms. Kelo received her condemnation notice the day before Thanksgiving in 2000. The case worked its way through the courts and as we know, it was unsuccessful.

A couple of items in the news lately have brought the judiciary back into the consciousness of the American public; the announced retirement of Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, and the recent decision by federal judge Barbara Crabb in Wisconsin in which she ruled that the National Day of Prayer is a violation of the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution. In the rulings of both justices we find an egregious disrespect for the plain meaning of the Constitution, and it is a failure of the American people to learn the Constitution that has allowed us to stray so far.

As a nation, we have reached a point where we bestow upon the courts an unjustified level of deference to their perceived wisdom. In fact, the Founding Fathers created the judiciary to be the weakest of the three branches, vested as they are with lifetime appointments.

Thomas Jefferson wrote (in a letter to William C. Jarvis, 1820) that “To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions [is] a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges are as honest as other men and not more so.” Yet today we have allowed the courts to be elevated to the level of an oligarchy, where we accept rulings that are clearly unaligned with the Constitution without so much as a whimper.

On June 23, 2005, the United State Supreme Court dealt a fatal blow to private property rights with the decision issued in Kelo v. New London. This landmark ruling allows state and local governments to use the previously redefined meaning of “public use” from the Fifth Amendment (also known as the Takings Clause) to use eminent domain to essentially steal property from one private entity and transfer it to another.

In case you’re not familiar with Kelo, here is some background. The City of New London, Connecticut sought to redevelop the Fort Trumbull neighborhood in hopes of increasing the city’s tax base (“economic development”). Several property owners refused to sell to the city, including Susette Kelo, and condemnation proceedings were started by New London Development Corporation, a private body acting on behalf of the city. Ms. Kelo received her condemnation notice the day before Thanksgiving in 2000. oThe case worked its way through the courts and as we know, it was unsuccessful.

As of today, the property taken by New London sits vacant, with not even the slightest appearance of development.