eminent domain used to build a ballpark

[Lounge Daddy]

[quote][b]Landowners must yield to ballpark[/b]

[font="Courier"]The District will begin using eminent domain to acquire parcels of land at the site of the Washington Nationals' ballpark by the end of this month, after unsuccessful negotiations with nearly half of the landowners.
    City officials said they expect to file court documents to take over at least some of the 21-acre site in the coming weeks and have $97 million set aside to buy the properties and help landowners relocate.
    The city made offers to all 23 landowners on the site last month but received no response from 10.
    "We think there are some that we'll have good-faith negotiations with," said Steve Green, director of development in the office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development. "There are some we haven't heard from at all."
    Many property owners on the site said the city's offers are inadequate. Others are suing the city on the grounds that it has no right to use eminent domain to acquire land at the site, despite a Supreme Court ruling affirming the right of municipal governments to take private property for the purpose of economic development. [/font][/quote]
[url="http://www.washtimes.com/national/20051006-120902-5838r.htm"]read the entire article HERE [/url]

they'll have to move - its for the good of the community

[Aloysius]

So when do we form our malitia to overthrow our oppressive government?

[RC_]

That just smells of elderberries...

[son_of_angels]

PLEASE....

This has nothing to do with liberalism or anything else. If anything it is conservativism, dealing out prizes to large companies at the little guys expense. NEVERTHELESS, any government, by its very nature and constitution, has the right to demand the property of its citizens for the good of the people as a whole. You don't like it, get a new government or elect somebody different. This is the nature of kingdoms, democracies, republics, or oligarchies alike.

[dairygirl4u2c]

eminent domain isn't always bad even if it's for econ purposes i don't think. in this case it looks like it bad.

i'm sure they'll see in court whether or not it qualifies as adequate "economic" criteria. these types of cases pop up all the time and are shot down at a similar rate. they're suing and talking about going to appeals courts for some of it, and they sound unsure of the outcome. don't be so quick to jump to conclusions.

[Aloysius]

it's called private property. this is socialism, which is definitely liberal.

talk to the supreme court where the liberal justices voted for this.

governments do not have the right to infringe upon private property. in kingdoms of old, the main thing that offset the power of the kings was the SQUIREARCHY-- the landowners-- the king could not just take land that was privately owned.

governments cannot infringe upon private property to any degree in Catholic social justice teaching. TO ANY DEGREE. That's why we condemn socialism in all its forms. private property is private property, not public property. the government should not turn it into public property.

[Aloysius]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' date='Oct 8 2005, 02:55 PM']eminent domain isn't always bad even if it's for econ purposes i don't think. in this case it looks like it bad.

i'm sure they'll see in court whether or not it qualifies as adequate "economic" criteria. these types of cases pop up all the time and are shot down at a similar rate. they're suing and talking about going to appeals courts for some of it, and they sound unsure of the outcome. don't be so quick to jump to conclusions.
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the supreme court already tyranically ruled that government can take land and give it to business.

that was the liberals. so much for liberals standing up for the little guy.

[Aloysius]

conservativism needn't always equal pro-big business.

though it seems in the modern paradigm "The business of Progressives [liberals] is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected." -GK Chesterton

sigh...

[dairygirl4u2c]

--the supreme court already tyranically ruled that government can take land and give it to business.--

yeah but what constitutes as legitimate purposes to take the land i'm sure is qualified. if it's not, it will be. the case isn't over at all.

but if your outrage is directed to the fact that busniess can take it, and not that this eminent domain actions is a sure thing, then i understand what you're saying.

[Aloysius]

pay attention to the news. the supreme court already had a case like this. they ruled it perfectly fine to use emminent domain for private businesses to take over people's lands if they thought it would bring in more tax money.

before that case, emminent domain was restricted solely to things like roadways and public parks. now, it's up for grabs.

you could challenge it... but the only two justices that have left the bench since that decision were on the right side of the decision, voting against allowing this. so there's no reason to foresee the supreme court coming in a few months or so after the last case it had like this and changing its mind.

this is all perfectly legal. God help us all.

[conservativecatholic]

[quote name='son_of_angels' date='Oct 8 2005, 01:48 PM']PLEASE....

[b]This has nothing to do with liberalism or anything else.  If anything it is conservativism, dealing out prizes to large companies at the little guys expense.  [/b]NEVERTHELESS, any government, by its very nature and constitution, has the right to demand the property of its citizens for the good of the people as a whole.  You don't like it, get a new government or elect somebody different.  This is the nature of kingdoms, democracies, republics, or oligarchies alike.
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Are you serious? If anything, conservatives have historically been shown to support small business, not big business. A prime example would be Thomas Jefferson's desire that America remain a traditional, bureaucratic-free, family farming, Agrarian society throughout the test of time. President Jefferson embodied the very essence of conservatism.

Edited October 8, 2005 by conservativecatholic

[philothea]

[quote name='conservativecatholic' date='Oct 8 2005, 03:41 PM']Are you serious? If anything, conservatives have historically been shown to support small business, not big business. A prime example would be Thomas Jefferson's desire that America remain a traditional, small family farming,  Agrarian society throughout the test of time. President Jefferson embodied the very essence of conservatism.
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Okay, maybe historically... but modern-day "conservatives" (read Republicans) are very much pro big business.

I wish they would support small businesses more.

[conservativecatholic]

considered strictly conservative. [quote name='philothea' date='Oct 8 2005, 03:55 PM']
Okay, maybe historically... but modern-day "conservatives" (read Republicans) are very much pro big business.

I wish they would support small businesses more.
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I knew someone would say this. Do not get confused with political parties and ideologies. Though the Republican Party leans to the right in some ways, in no way can it be considered as strictly conservative or comapred to Jefferson's vision of an Agrarian society.

[dairygirl4u2c]

-[the court said it was okay to use] emminent domain for private businesses to take over people's lands if they thought it would bring in more tax money.-

I think you'd have to read the actual case in order to draw out any qualifications. I'm sure they didn't rule that ALL private busniesses could. I bet it had qualificataions. Maybe like if the city is in dire need, the project is essentially nessary for the well being of the city etc. Not just so that a city thinks it can score some extra dough and decides to arbitarily take land.

Plus that's a very vaque statement that I quoted you on; even if it wasn't qualified, which I'm sure it was without even looking, if all it stated was something like "private businesses can take over people's land if they thought it'd bring in more money", I would imagine the judges who wrote that had the intent to have qualifications described in the last paragraph, even if those qualifications arne't there explicitly. So the lawyers would have to argue the intent of the judges given the circumstances of the case. I would bet money the qualifications would be there implicitly.

However the qualifications are there, there's always room for examening intent more and if the specific case mentioned here is truly analogously meeting the qualifications specified by court.

[son_of_angels]

When eminent domain is used by the government, it is the same as when it demands payment of taxes, or requires rationing for war-time, or appropriates farms for national security. These are all the same moral issue.

The problem with socialism is not the "right to property" per se, but also the covetousness which undergirds the socialist ideal. Publicly owned property, is not of itself immoral either. It only becomes immoral when those people from whom property is required, as a duty to the state, are not adequately taken care of, nor cared for.

Governments have intrinsic rights over the property of their citizens, as any study of history and political science, the question of morality only enters into the equation if the people do not have private property to care for themselves, or are denied some sort of compensation for their property. You could even see this in the conduct of the Papal States. We have, however, a structure in place to render compensation, called the courts.

[son_of_angels]

By the way, Thomas Jefferson's party was actually pretty liberal in many ways compared to the Federalist Party under Alexander Hamilton. They were for big government, yes, but they were also for a more free-market society and supported de-regulization and other such things in industry.

Of course the problem with the terms "liberal" and "conservative" is that they are relative to their respective ideologies. A conservative Communist is going to be for a strict control economy, while a liberal Communist is going to be for something more moderate.

In the same way, a liberal modern American would probably find himself out of place in the liberal vs. conservative debate in early America, not that those terms fully apply to American politics then or now.

I freely admit that, in modern American terminology, I am an Economic Liberal, in support of a tightly regulated, semi-free market economy (with the government exercising certain perogatives over production and service industies), which attempts to service the poor, develop communities, and prevent the wealthy from scandalizing the nation. I am, however, a social conservative, who also believes that the government's chief duty, especially in a Christian state, is the maintenance of good order, morality, and tranquility.

[Aloysius]

private property is exactly the problem with socialism. read rerum novarum by leo xiii.

the right to private property is one major thing that makes us distinct from the beasts. while there must be public property to an extent (roads and national parks)

I want to know where you're getting this 'governments have intrinsic rights over the property of its citizens' because it is NOT Catholic teaching.

I don't know much about the conduct of the papal states, maybe you could enlighten me, but there is nothing that says actions of the papal states couldn't have been wrong.

private property is absolutely supported by Catholic teaching. it cannot be infringed upon at all.

[Aloysius]

liberal economics fails on the Catholic Social Justice principal of subsidarity-- that everything that can be done at the lowest possible level should be left to that lowest possible level. you might think it's nice to have a massive government to help all the poor people, but that's making the little poor people [i]dependent[/i] on that big government. rather, the help for the poor people ought to be offered at the lowest possible and most personal level whereby they are not made dependent.

""Big Business and State Socialism are very much alike, especially Big Business." -G.K. Chesterton

both large government attempted help, and big business exploitation, enslave the working man.

anyway, without things available to be truly privately owned, we've lost something special to our humanity.

". . the socialist theory of collective property must be absolutely repudiated because it is harmful to the very ones whom it seeks to help, contrary to the natural rights of individuals, denaturalizes the functions of the State and disturbs the public peace. Let it therefore be firmly settled that the first foundation to be established for those who sincerely seek the good of the people is the [b][i]inviolability[/b][/i] of private property"

--Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum

[Aloysius]

"For, every man has by nature the right to possess property [i]as his own[/i]. This is one of the chief points of distinction between man and the animal creation, for the brute has no power of self direction, but is governed by two main instincts, which keep his powers on the alert, impel him to develop them in a fitting manner, and stimulate and determine him to action without any power of choice."

Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum

:

Private property is an inviolable right of man. when someone owns property, no force on earth has the right to take it away from him.

[theculturewarrior]

Birds of the sky have nests and foxes have dens but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest His head.