Time to sign up for the upcoming “Unpacking Private Property’s Bundle of Sticks” Symposium, sponsored by our shop and George Mason Law Review. September 15, 2026, 12:15 – 5:45 p.m., Arlington, Virginia.
Continue Reading Register Now For “Unpacking Private Property’s Bundle of Sticks” Symposium (PLF & GMU Law Review) (Sep. 15, 2026)
Worth checking out: Northland Management & Constr., LLC v. City of Parkland, No. 25-2239 (Aug. 3, 2026), from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, hich affirmed the district court’s conclusion after a bench trial that the city had inversely condemned Northland’s property (under Missouri law) because the city denied a certificate of occupancy.
Continue Reading The Outlaw Northland Swales? CA8 OK’s Inverse Judgment For City’s Denial Of Use (Which Also Failed Equal Protection Rational Basis Review)
It’s that time of the year again. Fall’s-a-coming, and that means that in a few days, we’re back at the William and Mary Law School in Williamsburg, Virginia to teach two courses: Eminent Domain and Property Rights (W&M is one of the few law schools in the country that offer a course in eminent domain, just compensation, and takings) -and Land Use Controls (an especially hot topic at the moment).
Continue Reading Back To School For Dirt Law @ William & Mary, Season 9
Here’s the latest in a case we’ve been closely following (because we represent the property owners!). In this Memorandum and Order, the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island invalidated the Town of Johnston’s ham-fisted attempt to take the property of a local family in order to move the current Town Hall from its present location in the center of town to the very outer border of the municipality, and build a new government complex. What is really going on is that this scheme only came about after the Town learned of the family’s plans to build affordable housing on their own land.
Continue Reading Town Has Not Been Delegated Eminent Domain Power And Can’t Just Make Up Its Own Procedures
Worth reading, if only for its somewhat odd logic is the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit’s opinion in BBLI Edison, LLC v. City of Chicago, No. 25-1713 (July 22, 2026), where the court upheld, against a takings challenge, a city requirement that anyone who acquires a rental property via foreclosure must either enter into new one-year leases with any existing tenant who desires to remain, or pay $10,600 if a tenant chooses to vacate.
Continue Reading CA7: Takings Claim “has something to it,” But City Requiring Owner Pay Relocation Fee To Tenants Is A “Clunky” Form Of Rent Control, So You Lose
Here’s the latest in an issue we’ve been following for a long time: must a property owner first try to change the law which is claimed to work a taking before bringing a takings claim in court? In other words, in order for the government to have made a “final decision” for Williamson County purposes does the legislature have to decline to amend the very law being challenged?
Continue Reading New Cert Petition: Does A Property Owner Need To Seek A Legislative Change To Ripen A Takings Claim?
Here’s the complete agenda for the 2026 Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Conference, October 14-16, 2026, in London. The Conference has gone international twice before (Beijing (2011) and The Hague (2016)). At the Conference, the Brigham-Kanner Property Rights prize will be presented to Professor James Penner, “whose scholarship has reshaped contemporary understandings of the nature and structure of property.” We’ll be speaking on “Property, Human Rights, and International Law” which will “consider how property rights are recognized, limited, and contested in international contexts.”
Continue Reading 2026 Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Conference Agenda (Oct. 14-16, 2026, London)
Here’s the latest in a case we’ve been following. (And an issue we’ve been following for a while.) [Disclosure: our shop filed an amicus brief in that case in favor of the property owner.] In Township of Jackson v. Getzel Bee, LLC, No. 090404 (N.J. July 20, 2026), the New Jersey Supreme Court invalidated a taking where the stated public use was to acquire property for open space, but the condemned properties were not going be be so used, but instead would be used to swap with another private owner, so its property could be used for open space.
Continue Reading New Jersey: No Taking To Swap Land With Someone Else
The essence of the infamous three-factor Penn Central test for whether a restriction on the use of private property under the police power “goes too far” and is treated as a de facto exercise of eminent domain is the Court’s admonition that the takings question is resolved by “essentially ad hoc, factual inquiries,” and not, generally speaking, by the application of categorical rules. To quote the unanimous Court (in an opinion authored by Justice Ginsburg), there is no “magic formula” to determine “in every case, whether a given government interference with property is a taking,” because “of the nearly infinite variety of ways in which government actions or regulations can affect property interests.” Thus, there are “few invariable rules in this area.”
Continue Reading CA9, 2-1: We Have A Magic Formula To Resolve Penn Central’s “Ad Hoc, Factual Inquiry” On 12(b)(6) In Every Case
Not a lot that’s earthshaking from the Supreme Court of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands in Sablan v. Commonwealth Utilities Corp., No. 2024-SCC-0023 (June 20, 2026), but we’re posting it because its holding — an entity lacking the power of eminent domain may nonetheless be liable for inverse condemnation — is important because it rightly concludes that the focus of the calculus in these cases is on the infringement of the property owner’s rights, not the technicalities of the government’s power.
Continue Reading “The constitutional duty to provide just compensation arises from the act of taking private property for public use, not the formal possession of eminent domain authority.” Entity Lacking Eminent Domain Power Can Be Liable For Taking Property