Timothy Sandefur of the Pacific Legal Foundation has a good post outlining the the dangers posed by a California ballot question drafted by local governments interested in expanding their already very broad power to condemn property: [J]ust before Christmas, the law firm of Rutan & Tucker—the leading California law firm for cities that want to […]
Archive | Property Rights
Can Ghosts Increase the Value of Your House?
Most students who take a property law class study the famous New York case of Stambovsky v. Ackley, where a New York court ruled that sellers of a house must disclose to potential buyers the fact that the house was reputedly haunted. The court concluded that the house was “haunted as a matter of law” […]
Upcoming Federalist Society Faculty Conference Presentation on my Next Book – The Grasping Hand: Kelo v. City of New London and the Limits of Eminent Domain
By Ilya Somin on December 26, 2013 11:25 am in Eminent Domain, Kelo, Post-Kelo Reform, Property Rights
Next week, on Friday, January 3, between 5 and 6:15 PM, I will be doing a presentation on my next book, tentatively entitled The Grasping Hand: Kelo v. City of New London and the Limits of Eminent Domain at the Federalist Society’s annual faculty conference. This will be a preview of the book, which will […]
Property Rights on the Moon?
Space law scholar Glenn Reynolds (AKA Instapundit) has an interesting USA Today column on the potential development of property rights on the Moon: On Saturday, a Chinese lunar probe made the first soft landing anyone’s made on the moon since 1976…. Though the landing was a big deal in China, most of the rest of […]
New London Mayor Advocates Devoting the Kelo Condemnation Site to a True “Public Use”
Eight years after the Supreme Court ruled in Kelo v. City of New London that private property can be taken and transferred to other private owners in order to promote “economic development” because such development qualifies as a “public use” under the Fifth Amendment, the Kelo condemnation site still lies empty. But New London Mayor […]
Philadelphia Condemns Artist’s Studio to Build a Supermarket and Parking Lot
Nick Sibilla of the Institute for Justice has a good article on the City of Philadelphia’s dubious efforts to condemn a successful artist’s studio in order to transfer it to a new private owner that would build a supermarket and parking lot on the site. This scheme isn’t quite paving paradise to put up a […]
A Poor Rationale for Banning Organ Markets
At National Review, Wesley Smith has a post criticizing a Canadian proposal to pay kidney donors. He supports banning such payments because they would “exploit” the poor: The drive to turn living human bodies of the poor and destitute into natural resources for the well off continues…. If organs can be purchased like a steak […]
NSFWCorp Article on Eminent Domain Relies on Inaccurate Name-Calling Instead of Argument
The NSFWCorp website has published an article by Yasha Levine (subscription required) attacking me and other libertarian critics of the City of Richmond’s plan to use eminent domain to condemn mortgages. Unfortunately, Levine doesn’t actually answer any of the arguments against the plan advanced by libertarian critics. Instead, he devotes his entire article to claiming […]
Federal Judge Dismisses Lawsuit Challenging Richmond, CA’s Plan to Condemn Underwater Mortgages, on Procedural Grounds
Federal District Judge Charles Breyer recently dismissed a lawsuit by mortgage lenders challenging the constitutionality of the City of Richmond’s plan to condemn over 600 underwater mortgages, while paying compensation far below market level. Judge Breyer dismissed the case on procedural grounds, because it is not yet “ripe” due to the fact that the city […]
My New Article on the Supreme Court’s Important Recent Takings Clause Decisions
My new Cato Supreme Court Review article on the Supreme Court’s major recent Takings Clause decisions is now available on SSRN. Here is the abstract [But see important update on technical issues with the PDF below.]: Property rights protected by the Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause have long been “relegated to the status of a poor […]
New Jersey Adopts Dubious Post-Kelo Eminent Domain “Reform” Law that is Likely to Endanger Property Rights More than it Protects Them
New Jersey recently became the 45th state to adopt an eminent domain reform law in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s controversial 2005 decision in Kelo v. City of New London, which ruled that it was constitutionally permissible for government to condemn private property and give it to another private owner in order to promote […]
Upcoming Talk on Property Rights at Cato Constitution Day
Next Tuesday, Sept. 17, from 1 PM to 2:15, co-blogger Ken Anderson and I will be taking part in a panel at the Cato Institute’s annual Constitution Day symposium, which will cover the major decisions of the Supreme Court’s 2012-13 term. My talk will focus on the Court’s important property rights decisions in Koontz v. […]
How a “Free” Program Could Cost Over $500 Million
The National Law Journal has an interesting report on the rising costs of the federal “Rails-to-Trails” program. What seemed like a neat way to create hiking and biking trails has spawned substantial amounts of litigation by landowners who assert the federal government cannot convert abandoned railroad easements to other uses without paying compensation. According to the […]
My JOTWELL Post on Will Baude’s “Rethinking the Federal Eminent Domain Power”
In my capacity as one of the editors for the constitutional law section of JOTWELL (a sited devoted to reviewing important new legal scholarship), I review an important new constitutional law article every summer. I usually try to pick articles that are 1) within one of my fields of expertise (primarily federalism and property rights), […]
The Passing of Ronald Coase
As co-blogger Jonathan Adler notes, Nobel Prize-winning economist and legendary law and economics scholar Ronald Coase passed away today at the age of 102. Coase was the author of such foundational articles as “The Problem of Social Cost,” and “The Nature of the Firm.” His contributions to scholarship are so massive that it is hard […]