The recent (June 2005) ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court in Kelo v/s New London has been one of the more egregious decisions to ever come out of that court. Two months later people all over the U.S. are still outraged over this. Interestingly the liberal leaning Sandra Day O'Conner was in the minority here and against the ruling.
But this ruling may be coming back to bite some of the liberal justices. Both Justices Bryer and Souter own property in New Hampshire and there are popular movements out there that are applying this very same ruling to deprive these two of their property!
Briefly the ruling says that the government can take away private property if one of the reasons is that it will result in increased tax revenue for the city. It basically takes away property rights which is the basis for the American Dream.
The New Hampshire Libertarian Party has started a petition to get the city to invoke eminent domain to rid Bryer of his 165 acre property in that state. In the case of Souter, there is a California resident who has started a nationwide campaign to have the town of Weare, N.H. to sieze Souter's 200-year old home and replace it with a hotel!
This is going to be interesting. If the two justices fight this, it could go all the way back to the Supreme Court. The question is won't all these justices have to recuse themselves? It is possible Chief Justice Renquist would be replaced by then by another conservative and Judge Roberts would have replaced O'Conner.
Let's see how this turns out.
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