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Property rights, as with all rights, exist only by law; which is to say that they are not unlimited, much less absolute. That's the way it is; that's the way of the world. Get used to it.
As to the idea that socialism might work, I see no reason it would not, on a small scale. My problem with socialism doesn't lie with the communal ownership of property, it lies with the central planning. Central planning is cumbersome and slow to respond to changes if the system gets larger. Despite your request not top point at history to make a point, if you examine history this is the one thing that stands out. Socialism works on a small scale, but fails when the system grows to large.
According to the conservative right wing Supreme Court, making money supersedes all property rights. If a town can figure out a way to make money off your property, then they deserve to take it from you.
Though one component of the protection provided by the Takings Clause is that the government can take private property only if it provides just compensation for the taking, the Takings Clause also prohibits the government from taking property except for public use. Were it otherwise, the Takings Clause would either be meaningless or empty. If the Public Use Clause served no function other than to state that the government may take property through its eminent domain powerfor public or private usesthen it would be surplusage. See ante, at 34 (OConnor, J., dissenting); see also Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 174 (1803) (It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect); Myers v. United States, 272 U.S. 52, 151 (1926). Alternatively, the Clause could distinguish those takings that require compensation from those that do not. That interpretation, however, would permit private property to be taken or appropriated for private use without any compensation whatever. Cole v. La Grange, 113 U.S. 1, 8 (1885) (interpreting same language in the Missouri Public Use Clause). In other words, the Clause would require the government to compensate for takings done for public use, leaving it free to take property for purely private uses without the payment of compensation. This would contradict a bedrock principle well established by the time of the founding: that all takings required the payment of compensation. 1 Blackstone 135; 2 J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law 275 (1827) (hereinafter Kent); J. Madison, for the National Property Gazette, (Mar. 27, 1792), in 14 Papers of James Madison 266, 267 (R. Rutland et al. eds. 1983) (arguing that no property shall be taken directly even for public use without indemnification to the owner).1 The Public Use Clause, like the Just Compensation Clause, is therefore an express limit on the governments power of eminent domain. The most natural reading of the Clause is that it allows the government to take property only if the government owns, or the public has a legal right to use, the property, as opposed to taking it for any public purpose or necessity whatsoever. At the time of the founding, dictionaries primarily defined the noun use as [t]he act of employing any thing to any purpose. 2 S. Johnson, A Dictionary of the English Language 2194 (4th ed. 1773) (hereinafter Johnson). The term use, moreover, is from the Latin utor, which means to use, make use of, avail ones self of, employ, apply, enjoy, etc. J. Lewis, Law of Eminent Domain §165, p. 224, n. 4 (1888) (hereinafter Lewis). When the government takes property and gives it to a private individual, and the public has no right to use the property, it strains language to say that the public is employing the property, regardless of the incidental benefits that might accrue to the public from the private use. The term public use, then, means that either the government or its citizens as a whole must actually employ the taken property. See id., at 223 (reviewing founding-era dictionaries).
A corrolary to this is that management is centralized for common property thereby removing it from innovative uses and redirections which can make it more productive in distributed hands.. (for a backwards 1 and 1/2 with a twist -- see the KELO case under eminent domain)
Property rights, as with all rights, exist only by law; which is to say that they are not unlimited, much less absolute. That's the way it is; that's the way of the world. Get used to it.
Does that mean that if we change the law someone could kill you because the only right you have to live comes form the law? Do you actually believe that your right to breathe comes from the law, or is it something more fundamental?
Property rights, as with all rights, exist only by law; which is to say that they are not unlimited, much less absolute. That's the way it is; that's the way of the world. Get used to it.
Does that mean that if we change the law someone could kill you because the only right you have to live comes form the law? Do you actually believe that your right to breathe comes from the law, or is it something more fundamental?
Yes. Even the very air we breathe is subject to legal regulation. Get used to it.
Maybe you should take another look at your history. Kelo v City of New London was a 5-4 decision where the conservatives generally disagreed with the liberal majority which held that local governments could take private property and turn it over to private developers.
The majority, therefore, merely followed the precedent established in Fallbrook and rejected the petitioners argument for a literal requirement. The petitioners could just as well have been a multi-billion dollar, multi-national corporation subject to the same eminent domain taking.[T]his is not a case in which the City is planning to open the condemned land--at least not in its entirety--to use by the general public. Nor will the private lessees of the land in any sense be required to operate like common carriers, making their services available to all comers. But although such a projected use would be sufficient to satisfy the public use requirement, this "Court long ago rejected any literal requirement that condemned property be put into use for the general public." Id., at 244. Indeed, while many state courts in the mid-19th century endorsed "use by the public" as the proper definition of public use, that narrow view steadily eroded over time. Not only was the "use by the public" test difficult to administer (e.g., what proportion of the public need have access to the property? at what price?),7 but it proved to be impractical given the diverse and always evolving needs of society.8 Accordingly, when this Court began applying the Fifth Amendment to the States at the close of the 19th century, it embraced the broader and more natural interpretation of public use as "public purpose." See, e.g., Fallbrook Irrigation Dist. v. Bradley, 164 U. S. 112, 158-164 (1896). Thus, in a case upholding a mining company's use of an aerial bucket line to transport ore over property it did not own, Justice Holmes' opinion for the Court stressed "the inadequacy of use by the general public as a universal test." Strickley v. Highland Boy Gold Mining Co., 200 U. S. 527, 531 (1906).9 We have repeatedly and consistently rejected that narrow test ever since.
So again, the Court acknowledges precedent and accedes to the local jurisdictions definition of a public purpose.The disposition of this case therefore turns on the question whether the City's development plan serves a "public purpose." Without exception, our cases have defined that concept broadly, reflecting our longstanding policy of deference to legislative judgments in this field.
Kelo is among the more misunderstood of recent Court cases. The actual meaning of the ruling was lost as both liberals and conservatives contrived their own meanings to serve their respective political agendas.
The case had nothing to do with the little people at odds with evil corporate monsters. At issue only was the definition of public use, and if the Citys development plan met the public use requirement. Indeed, Ms. Kelo was requesting the Court make her case an exception to the established definition:
Justice OConnor, with whom The Chief Justice, Justice Scalia, and Justice Thomas join, dissenting. Over two centuries ago, just after the Bill of Rights was ratified, Justice Chase wrote:
An act of the Legislature (for I cannot call it a law) contrary to the great first principles of the social compact, cannot be considered a rightful exercise of legislative authority . A few instances will suffice to explain what I mean . [A] law that takes property from A. and gives it to B: It is against all reason and justice, for a people to entrust a Legislature with such powers; and, therefore, it cannot be presumed that they have done it. Calder v. Bull, 3 Dall. 386, 388 (1798) (emphasis deleted).
Today the Court abandons this long-held, basic limitation on government power. Under the banner of economic development, all private property is now vulnerable to being taken and transferred to another private owner, so long as it might be upgradedi.e., given to an owner who will use it in a way that the legislature deems more beneficial to the publicin the process. To reason, as the Court does, that the incidental public benefits resulting from the subsequent ordinary use of private property render economic development takings for public use is to wash out any distinction between private and public use of propertyand thereby effectively to delete the words for public use from the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Accordingly I respectfully dissent.
I'd like to discuss the core issue underlying the capitalism/socialism debate: the issue of property 'ownership'.
Up front, in the interest of full disclosure, I've always leaned strongly libertarian, strongly free-market. And while I have issues with a few of the fundamental rules framing corporate capitalism (limited liability, etc..), I see private control over resources and the 'means of production' as preferable to control by a compulsive state government.
That said, unlike many of my libertarian/free-market friends, I don't see the concept of some alternative to private property 'unthinkable'. We already handle many other aspects of our environment communally and it doesn't seem crazy to us. In fact, the alternative might seem worse; do we really want to treat the air we breath as an ownable property? We've agreed to hold significant swaths of real estate and resources (roads, parks, etc) as 'public' property and this seems to work ok. So, why not the 'means of production'?
I'd like to avoid the usual partisan vitriol here, and actual discuss the issue in good faith. Even if you are adamantly opposed to socialism, I'll ask that you work with the assumption that it might work.
The other thing I'd like to avoid, from both 'sides' of the argument, is the reliance on historical data. The problem with using historical examples is always the lack of complete information and the lack of any possible counterfactuals to understand the situation. Did socialism fail in the USSR because it was implemented by a totalitarian government, or did it become totalitarian as a logical progression of socialism? Are modern socialists states succeeding because of socialism, or in spite of it? We can't really know the answers to these kind of questions. In any case, the contexts of these other nations are all different than ours. I'd like to discuss how we might work without private property here, in the U.S., with our situation, and our values as a people.
Property rights will be a thing of the past if some people get their way.
In IA a town is attempting to require that all businesses and apartments with more than 3 units produce copies of all keys to the property for use by fire and police departments.
Opposition organizes to beat key box ordinance
Pretty soon your home or business won't be yours and forget about being "secure in your person, houses, papers and effects"
Thomas Jefferson.And I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories.
Free to do what, Mr. Windbag? All rights in property, whether in fee, tenancy, license or incorporeal hereditament, exist only by law. Nor are you free to do anything you wish with your property. The old shibboleth that "a man's home is his castle" was never true, for all property rights have always been subject to the power of the federal, state and municipal authority, witness the myriad laws, statutes, zoning ordinances, easements, rights or way, and use restrictions that limit the rights of property ownership. Even a prescriptive right is only valid to the extent recognized by law. If you need further proof, just try putting on an addition to your house without a building permit and see what happens to you, not to mention your property. (Recently, the owner of an office highrise in San Diego had to take off the top two floors of his building because they intruded on federal airspace.) There are some jurisdictions (e.g., Glendale, Arizona) that even regulate the amount of water your toilet can flush. So if you think youre king of your castle, youd better start using a chamber pot for a throne!
Quantum Windbag:
As to the idea that socialism might work, I see no reason it would not, on a small scale. My problem with socialism doesn't lie with the communal ownership of property, it lies with the central planning. Central planning is cumbersome and slow to respond to changes if the system gets larger. Despite your request not top point at history to make a point, if you examine history this is the one thing that stands out. Socialism works on a small scale, but fails when the system grows to large.
Generally all you said ditto.. But it is ALSO the "communal ownership of property" itself. Because the rules for sharing of that property are dependent on the FORM of the governance. Much less aggregious are the rules for sharing of CORPORATE property that we all understand. But in the case of GOVT owned property -- it's a crap shoot. To wit -- the Iraq oil fields under Saddam Hussein. (I know that's forbidden by the rules set out for this thread -- but it's an example. ) Had we marched into Iraq with a few truckloads of stock certificates for the oil fields to be distributed among the populace, we probably could have left without spending a penny on reconstruction or a life.
In fact, MOST of the Arab spring today is because the valuable land (oil producing) in those countries are in hands that do not set fair rules for "sharing". Technically, they are communally held. Do you want to risk it?
...My problem with socialism doesn't lie with the communal ownership of property, it lies with the central planning. Central planning is cumbersome and slow to respond to changes if the system gets larger.
I would also like to point out that the means of production is often owned by the community in our current system. We have a word for that in the United States, corporation. Like socialism, I see problems when corporations get too big. They become unwieldy and slow to respond to market forces. We saw that recently when the government argued that some corporations got too big to fail. Imagine if, instead of just bailing them out, they would have had to bail themselves out. How would that have worked out in the long run?
Quantum Windbag:
As to the idea that socialism might work, I see no reason it would not, on a small scale. My problem with socialism doesn't lie with the communal ownership of property, it lies with the central planning. Central planning is cumbersome and slow to respond to changes if the system gets larger. Despite your request not top point at history to make a point, if you examine history this is the one thing that stands out. Socialism works on a small scale, but fails when the system grows to large.
Generally all you said ditto.. But it is ALSO the "communal ownership of property" itself. Because the rules for sharing of that property are dependent on the FORM of the governance. Much less aggregious are the rules for sharing of CORPORATE property that we all understand. But in the case of GOVT owned property -- it's a crap shoot. To wit -- the Iraq oil fields under Saddam Hussein. (I know that's forbidden by the rules set out for this thread -- but it's an example. ) Had we marched into Iraq with a few truckloads of stock certificates for the oil fields to be distributed among the populace, we probably could have left without spending a penny on reconstruction or a life.
In fact, MOST of the Arab spring today is because the valuable land (oil producing) in those countries are in hands that do not set fair rules for "sharing". Technically, they are communally held. Do you want to risk it?
Im don't see how redistributing wealth solves the problem of wealth inequality under a private property based economy. You could do the same thing here in America, expropriate the means of production and equally distribute shares among the population to give everyone part ownership. In ten years you would be back to the same lopsided wealth distribution that we see today because the smartest would end up acqiring everybody else's shares.
Quantum Windbag:
Generally all you said ditto.. But it is ALSO the "communal ownership of property" itself. Because the rules for sharing of that property are dependent on the FORM of the governance. Much less aggregious are the rules for sharing of CORPORATE property that we all understand. But in the case of GOVT owned property -- it's a crap shoot. To wit -- the Iraq oil fields under Saddam Hussein. (I know that's forbidden by the rules set out for this thread -- but it's an example. ) Had we marched into Iraq with a few truckloads of stock certificates for the oil fields to be distributed among the populace, we probably could have left without spending a penny on reconstruction or a life.
In fact, MOST of the Arab spring today is because the valuable land (oil producing) in those countries are in hands that do not set fair rules for "sharing". Technically, they are communally held. Do you want to risk it?
Im don't see how redistributing wealth solves the problem of wealth inequality under a private property based economy. You could do the same thing here in America, expropriate the means of production and equally distribute shares among the population to give everyone part ownership. In ten years you would be back to the same lopsided wealth distribution that we see today because the smartest would end up acqiring everybody else's shares.
In the example of the Iraqi Oil fields, if America HAD divvyed up the shares and distributed them, we'd be long gone when they discovered the "redistribution" secret. But NOBODY is going to busy bombing and insurrecting (or tolerating such acts) when they are "newly rich" are they?
In all seriousness, the chance to get income from a common asset is awfully tempting to keep to yourself (rather than sell it) in a country where that asset is the most important and most reliable. And having the certificates in the hands of the people would assure interest in the creation of a responsive and stable govt. Wouldn't work if there were other ventures for capital to flow to that might rival the income and stability of oil in Iraq.
