by Sheldon Richman
Sheldon Richman is the editor of The Freeman and In brief.
Last Friday was the first anniversary of a sad occasion, the day the U.S. Supreme Court said the Constitution permits the politicians who run New London, Connecticut, to throw people out of their homes so the land can become part of a ritzy private waterfront development that is expected to produce more tax revenue than the residences that stand there now. In modern America workers are expropriated for the benefit of capitalists. (See my article from last year here [PDF].)
Also last week the final two holdouts in New London, including Susette Kelo, whose name is immortalized in the title of the case, bowed to the inevitable and settled with the government. As the Associated Press put it, Kelo, the lead plaintiff in the Supreme Court case, and [Pasquale] Cristofaro had faced the possibility of forced eviction from their homes in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood to make way for a hotel, convention center and upscale condominiums. Referring to her nightmare, Kelo said, It's not positive for me because I've got to go. I'm not happy about it.
She's lived in that house all her life. A state legislator says the settlement includes a provision to move it elsewhere, but for Kelo that alternative is no better than second best. Her well-being has been forcibly sacrificed for what is glibly called the general welfare. A closer look reveals that the welfare being served is far less general than first meets the eye. For some reason, Mussolini's words come to mind: Fascism conceives of the State as an absolute, in comparison with which all individuals or groups are relative, only to be conceived of in their relation to the State. . . . The Fascist State organizes the nation, but leaves a sufficient margin of liberty to the individual; the latter is deprived of all useless and possibly harmful freedom, but retains what is essential; the deciding power in this question cannot be the individual, but the State alone. . . .
Naturally, politicians and planners were thrilled with the Kelo ruling. But it upset lots of people who have no connection to political power; they now live in fear that they could lose their homes whenever local officials decide someone else might put the properties to better (meaning better tax-producing) use. The public outcry scared enough politicians that 21 states enacted limits on the taking of property for economic development. Similar legislation is pending in several others. Being good politicians, however, they left themselves an out by making an exception for blighted areas. The term is usually so vaguely defined that in the end it will likely be little or no protection at all.
The national government also got into the act. The House of Representatives voted to prohibit federal financing of local development projects that use eminent domain (federal financing of other kinds of projects is fine), but the Senate hasn't acted yet. And President Bush issued an executive order prohibiting federal agencies from taking private property except for so-called public projects: roads, parks, government office buildings, hospitals, and the like. (Will working people not mind being thrown out of their homes for bureaucratic office space?)
President Bush's order is largely academic because the federal government doesn't take property for private projects, such as shopping centers. That's more a local custom. Doug Kendall, executive director of Community Rights Counsel, a pro-eminent domain group, said, This order appears to apply to a null, or virtually null set of government actions. I'm not aware of any federal government agency that takes property for economic development.
A Useful Tool
The Enlightened class, of course, lustily cheered the Supreme Court ruling. Only unsophisticated little people, who think nothing of standing in the way of progress, were appalled. In marking the anniversary, the New York Times said in its editorial Responsible Use of Eminent Domain: The ruling set off talk of 'eminent domain abuse.' What has been lost in the discussion is the good that eminent domain can do. It has long been a key tool by which cities can upgrade deteriorating neighborhoods and assemble land for affordable housing. The Times then felt conscience-bound to confess that it has benefited from eminent domain in clearing the land for the new building it is constructing opposite the Port Authority Bus Terminal. That gives a whole new meaning to freedom of the press.
I'm grateful the Times mentioned this because it reminded me to launch a broadside against private businesses that build on land legally stolen for them from its rightful owner. No recipient of the fruits of eminent domain can honestly call himself a champion of individual liberty. Free-marketeers routinely support the big retail chain stores against their anti-corporate critics, but companies that lobby for privileges don't deserve support. How can they demand freedom to operate in the marketplace when they refuse to forswear the receipt of stolen property?
As for the Times' point that eminent domain can be useful for fixing up rundown neighborhoods and creating affordable housing, a free market would actually do it if government would get out of the way. After all, government policies have created the conditions that the planners now propose to improve. To put it mildly, the government urban-renewal record is bad. But what would we expect of a policy that treats people like chess pieces?
The editorial referred to eminent domain abuse, but this term gives the principle of eminent domain credit it does not deserve by wrongly implying that it can be both used and abused. Advocates of individual rights know better. Like the craft of mugging, it can only be abused.