Your Property No Longer

What the hell is this country coming to? We’re trying to step all over our freedoms in order to “protect” the symbol of that very freedom. We’ve got a Federal Government run by Republicans who are supposedly supporters of less Federal Government and more State responsibility, but are actively denying State’s rights to determine where Liquified Natural Gas terminals are installed in their locales. And just today, we’ve got a Supreme Court who basically just abolished protections against the eminent domain sections of the 5th Amendment.

Basically, some Connecticut residents are going to have their homes and property razed to make way for, of all things, an office park, hotel and shops. Oh yeah, that’s certainly a worthwhile reason to seize people’s homes and property. The state says that the construction of the office park will benefit the public because it will provide new jobs and tax revenue. Can you imagine what these residents are going through? Imaging some overpaid, pensioned State Government weasel shows up at your door and informs you that they are going to take your house and property and turn it over to private builders and businesses in the hopes that it might stimulate the local economy. Let that sink in. Next you fight all the way to the Supreme Court but the highest court in the land has basically betrayed you to private interests. It’s unbelievable. As dissenting Supreme Court Justice, Sandra Day-O’Connor wrote:

“Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random,” she wrote. “The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms.”

The local government is basically walking into your life, uprooting it and telling you its for the public good. They are SEIZING privately owned property to build a HOTEL, a HEALTH CLUB and an OFFICE BUILDING! HOLY SHIT! Think about that for a minute. Next week, your local government could now decide that your home is on a piece of land that would be ideal for a new health club because of its location near multiple businesses. They give you some cash for what your house is supposedly worth (but probably much less than what you could sell it for), boot you out of your OWN HOME, knock it down and build that PRIVATELY-OWNED health club. Doesn’t anyone think that might be more power than we’d want our government to have? Eminent domain should only be used in extreme circumstances for a very detailed and appreciable public good.

I can’t even wrap my mind around how invasive and abusive this ruling is, and I’m reeling at how easily abused I believe it will become in the future.

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 23rd, 2005 at 3:01pm and is filed under News, Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.