Kelo vs. City of New London: the liberal faction of the U.S. Supreme Court, with the help of swinger Justice Kennedy, endorses the absolute power of government to take property in the name of economic development. John at Blogs of War rounds up links and says:
Corrupt, cheaply bought, local officials now hold your family's future in their hands. This is the breeding ground of a revolution.
George F. Will notes the liberal thought process but also senses danger for conservatives.
The question answered yesterday was: Can government profit by seizing the property of people of modest means and giving it to wealthy people who can pay more taxes than can be extracted from the original owners? The court answered yes.Liberalism triumphed yesterday. Government became radically unlimited in seizing the very kinds of private property that should guarantee individuals a sphere of autonomy against government.
Conservatives should be reminded to be careful what they wish for. Their often-reflexive rhetoric praises "judicial restraint" and deference to -- it sometimes seems -- almost unleashable powers of the elected branches of governments. However, in the debate about the proper role of the judiciary in American democracy, conservatives who dogmatically preach a populist creed of deference to majoritarianism will thereby abandon, or at least radically restrict, the judiciary's indispensable role in limiting government.
Rev. Donald Sensing has a prediction:
It’s not our homes that are most at risk despite this case. It’s America’s churches, synagogues and mosques.If the purported intention of such property condemnation and seizure is increasing tax revenue, as Justice Stevens clearly believed it was, then there is no kind of building more vulnerable than a house of worship, for the simple reason that cities do not collect property taxes from houses of worship, nor any other kind of tax.
Furthermore, churches especially tend [to] occupy choice urban and suburban real estate because when towns were founded, one of the very earliest buildings to be erected was a church, almost always several churches of different denominations. In every city and town in America you will find churches sitting on what is now some of the most valuable land there.
Deterrence should be the first public response: any public official who chooses to exercise this newfound permission should be thrown out of office and made into an example by the voters.
Posted by Alan at June 24, 2005 12:29 AM