In 2005, the US Supreme Court issued its now infamous Kelo opinion which ruled it constitutional for governments to use the power of eminent domain to seize homes and businesses and turn them over to private parties who would develop the properties in ways that would increase the government's tax base. The Constitution only allows government to take property by eminent domain "for public use" - not for whatever politicians think is a good idea. Poorer Americans, especially racial minorities and seniors, are the people most often affected by government's abuse of eminent domain. Those who lose their homes in this manner to private developers are real victims. It was their misfortune to live on pieces of land that politically-connected developers and the politicians to whom they're connected have decided the owners no longer deserve to keep. Currently, there is no remedy for victims of eminent domain use for private development. In only one year following the Kelo...(Read Full Post)