Those of you who are students of eminent domain and the public use requirement know that in Berman v. Parker, 348 U.S. 26 (1954), the Court (in)famously held, “when the legislature has spoken, the public interest has been declared in terms well nigh conclusive.”
Not only was the Court in Berman signalling that it
A new student-authored journal article worth reading, Christine Dong, “Vacancy Taxes: A Possible Taking?,” 91 U. Chi. L. Rev. 1725 (2024).
Here’s the Abstract:
Vacancy taxes are an increasingly popular solution to the paradoxical problem of high housing demand coupled with high vacancy. Cities across the country facing housing shortages have either implemented
Like most “paranormal caught on camera” shots,
this one is grainy. But you can just make Mr. Jefferson out.
Colonial Williamsburg is adjacent to the William & Mary Law School, so from time-to-time, we’ll take a walk over just to soak up the atmosphere. The vibe picks up in the autumn season, when the
On Monday, we joined our land use colleagues Dwight Merriam, Professor Shelley Saxer, and Professor David Callies for the Hawaii Bar Association’s Section of Real Property and Financial Services program, “Property Rights & Regulatory Takings,” a wide-ranging and very well-attended program for Hawaii dirt lawyers.
As the above photo notes (L to R:
So close: if just one more Justice had agreed, the U.S. Supreme Court would have taken up a public use case we’ve been following, Brinkmann v. Town of Southhold. After all, this one had a lot of the usual markers: a divided court below, an allegation of a lower court split, beaucoup amicus support
This out of Sweden: the Royal Swedish Academy of Science has announced that it will be awarding the 2024 Nobel Prize in Economics to three U.S. econ professors whose research demonstrates that the rule of law and property rights foster an environment where democracy and prosperity flourish:
The laureates have shown that one explanation for
Following up on our recent post about the California Coastal Commission denying permission for Space-X to increase the number of annual launches from Vandenberg, comes this, the other shoe.
The Commission has now been sued, with Space-X alleging that the Commission denied permission due to CEO Elon Musk’s political leanings and his public
Here’s the latest in a case we’ve been following, which asks whether a local ordinance which allowed non-paying tenants to remain in the lessor’s property is a physical taking, or merely the regulation of the lessor/lessee relationship under the Yee theory, which posits that once an owner voluntarily rents property to a tenant
You understand that there are just some cases where a certain analysis and outcome appeal to your intellect, but your gut goes “ick,” and you’d bet that a judge’s (or judges’) reaction would be similar. Thus, intellectual analysis takes a backseat to the gut. (What one of our mentors referred to as “the widow plaintiff”
The California Coastal Commission has now reached the parody stage.
In the “Star Trek” TV shows and movies, Starfleet Headquarters is depicted as being across the Golden Gate from San Francisco, in the Marin Headlands. It’s a longstanding joke among those who know about the regulatory overreach of the California