Quote:
Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
If I understand correctly, you are suggesting that when the state takes land from me to build a hospital, it does not need to compensate me for this because I and the rest of the public benefit from the future hospital. Not to confuse you by outflanking you on the right or anything, but this strikes me as crazy.
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I think you misunderstand him:
"nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation"
Club assumes the compensation is just (although if it were, then the likelihood of dispute diminishes significantly)--that is, it's a necessary condition. But there's a second condition--that the taking be for "public" use, which club recognizes also is in the constitution. Taking property from one private citizen adn giving it to another is not putting the property to public use and therefore absolutely barred by the constitution (contra Jed Rubenfeld, Usings, Yale LJ, who argues those takings need not be compensated at all; accord Democrats)
If we need to distinguish for G3's hypo, (which we don't because that's what's happening in CT essentially), the argument goes that there is in fact a public use in taking completely derelict property and converting it from slums into something useful for the public. Granted, that's simply a question of degree, because none of the plaintiffs in CT believe they're in a slum.
