*Columbia University Uses Eminent Domain To Grab Two Properties: *Law
Professor Glenn Reynolds isn't happy
<http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/columbia_vs_the_little_guy_1Kx7nuGlUH2Pzvc4mwGvhK>
about that. (Neither am I.)
This was demonstrated again this week, as the last legal barrier (a
possible US Supreme Court review) to Columbia University's efforts
to condemn and seize two businesses -- Tuck-it-Away Self-Storage and
a gas station owned by Gurnam Singh and Parminder Kaur in West
Harlem -- vanished.
. . . .
Traditionally, the "public-domain" power was used to acquire
property needed for things like roads and bridges. It's still often
defended in those terms, but the "public use" required for such
takings has now been interpreted by courts to include pretty much
anything the government wants to do with the property -- including
handing it over to someone else who just happens to be wealthier or
better-connected than the original property holder.
Reynolds is right to condemn this action, and right to say that people
with little money or power are often victimized by these actions.
But Reynolds goes a little too far when he claims that the wealthy and
powerful are never victimized by this kind of abuse of government power.
Sometimes they are --- especially if they backed the wrong candidate
in the last election. For example, Rupert Murdoch --- who does not lack
for money or power --- was forced to give up the /New York Post/ for
some years, thanks to a provision inserted in the law by Ted Kennedy
<http://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/07/us/kennedy-and-paper-battle-in-boston.html>.
Anyone familiar with the Kennedy family history can think of other
examples that fit this pattern.
- 10:51 AM, 17 December 2010 [link]
<http://www.seanet.com/%7Ejimxc/Politics/December2010_3.html#jrm9459>
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