re: #219 Simply Sarah

Just to follow up on Congress trying to undo the results of Kelo, even though people have moved on.

In this case, it’s not really that they’re making a law to “overrule” the Supreme Court. What was ruled in Kelo was that the seizure by eminent domain was allowed by the Constitution. That is, the power of the government extends that far. The government can still say “Well, we won’t use that power.”, which is what the federal government is basically considering here.

I thought the thing about the Kelo Decision was less about the power of eminent domain than a locality using it to transfer property from one set of private hands to another set of private hands simply under the basis that the latter party would carry out development that would benefit the community. Which stretched the normal use of eminent domain where the conversion is generally into public use. (And I’m sure I’m generalizing here a bit.)