Today’s post is by our Pacific Legal Foundation colleague Kady Valois, writing about a recent Federal Circuit Rails-to-Trails takings case, Behrens v. United States, No. 22-1277 (Feb. 13, 2023).
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How The West Was Won: Easements!
by Kady Valois
There’s a saying that the west was won by pioneers, settlers, and adventurers.
Remember that case from a couple of years back, where the Supreme Court, by a tantalizingly close vote, declined to grant a cert petition seeking review of an Illinois decision that preventing future blight was a sufficiently public use to support a redevelopment taking?
A law student at Catholic U. law school recently made a
Here’s the merits brief, filed yesterday in the above-depicted Court by our law firm colleagues, headed by Counsel of Record Christina Martin in Tyler v. Hennepin County, No. 22-166, a case and an issue we’ve been following closely. This is the one, where, as recounted in the petition:
Hennepin County
The Chief Justice Wants YOU to attend this webinar.
We try to remember anniversaries and birthdays. Some welcome, like the recent 100th of Pennsylvania Coal v. Mahon. Some maybe not so welcome, like this, the 200th anniversary of Johnson and Graham’s Lessee v. M’Intosh, 21 U.S. (7 Wheat.) 543 (Feb. 28, 1823).
That’s
Would not have guessed that The Fenwicks, described as “America’s only Afro-Celtic Yiddish Ska band,” and compared to “Oingo Boingo on steroids” would have a song about eminent domain & property rights, “Preeminent Domain.”
But there it is. Check it out.
Check this out, a new article co-authored by a federal judge’s law clerk and lawprof Lior Strahilevitz (Chicago). With the title, “Toward Principled Background Principles in Takings Law” are we going to read it? You bet. (Unlike a lot of new scholarship that we post here, we read this one immediately.)
Here’s the
If you are in Honolulu, please join us on Wednesday, March 8, 2023, 4:30-5:30 p.m. at the University of Hawaii Law School for Professor Thomas Mitchell on “Heirs’ Property and the Uniform Partition of Heirs Property Act: Challenges, Solutions, and Historic Reform.”
Our U.H. Land Use class is attending to learn more about “heirs’ property” (described as “the biggest problem you’ve never heard of“), and so should you. Yes, Hawaii has adopted the Uniform Partition of Heirs’ Property Act and we have followed this issue for some time, but if you didn’t know about this, now is your chance to catch up.
Here are the details from the U.H. newsletter:
Carlsmith Ball presents the 2023 Distinguished Gifford Lecturer in Real Property, Thomas W. Mitchell. Mitchell is a professor at Boston College Law School, where he holds the Robert F. Drinan, S.J. Endowed Chair and serves as the Director of the Initiative on Land, Housing & Property Rights. He is a national expert on property issues facing disadvantaged families and communities and has published leading scholarly works addressing these matters.
In 2020, Professor Mitchell was named one of 21 recipients of the MacArthur Fellowship in recognition of the substantial impact his professional work has had in assisting disadvantaged farmers and property owners, people who are disproportionately but not exclusively African American and other people of color. He is the only lawyer in his MacArthur Fellowship class. Please join us for this Distinguished Gifford Lecture; a light reception is to follow from 5:30 – 6:30 p.m.
Come, join us for this compelling session.
Continue Reading Join Us On Wed March 8 at 4:30pm For 2023 Distinguished Gifford Lecture In Real Property – Prof Thomas Mitchell On “Heirs’ Property & the Uniform Partition of Heirs’ Property Act: Challenges, Solutions, & Historic Reform”
As part of the nationwide reaction to Kelo v. New London, Indiana adopted a statute that in some cases requires the condemnor to compensate property owners at not just fair market value, but at 150% of FMV.
As far as we can tell, the Indiana Court of Appeals’ opinion in Guzzo v. Town
The International Right of Way Association‘s Real Estate Law Committee produces twice-a-year reports “which contain summaries of eminent domain decisions and legislation within the United States.”
And what is really nice is that they make the report available.
Here’s the latest.
We’re posting it here because we’re one of the co-authors. Hat tip
Most of the time these days, we’re rooting for cert granted. That comes, naturally, from our work pushing cases and issues up to the Supreme Court, looking to correct lower court errors and in the process make some good law. And that usually entails being on the “petitioner” side of things. Cases like Sackett