Michael Kinsley Quotes

The exercise of the power of eminent domain is against common right. It subverts the usual attributes of the ownership of property.

One would expect that private property taken by eminent domain would become land available for public use such as parks and roads. Unfortunately, this decision creates a loophole for government to manipulate the definition of public use simply to generate greater tax revenue.

The fifth amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees that no private property shall be taken for a public use without the payment of just compensation.

Governments should not be able to bulldoze a person's home or business to benefit other individuals.

Last Thursday, our Supreme Court backed that local governments can co-opt private property, and give it to another private entity, for economic development.

An expropriating property protector (the state, through taxation) is a contradiction in terms

In a polling conducted by the Wall Street Journal, 11 out of 12 Americans said they oppose the taking of private property, even if it is for public economic good.

People in Eastern Washington should be confident in knowing that the government will not come and seize their property or farm land. Legislation is needed to correct this decision and restore the principle of having limited government involvement.

... to teach the necessity of respect for the rights of persons and property as fundamental to every form of government...to teach the duty of government, to encourage and protect individual and group initiative and enterprise, to foster the right to work, earn, save and acquire property, and to preserve the ownership and lawful use of property when acquired.

An owner’s right to exclude others from his property is the means by which he can avoid “bads” from happening: events that will lower the value of his property. By means of an unceasing flood of redistributive legislation, the democratic state has worked relentlessly not only to strip its citizens of all arms (weapons) but also to strip domestic property owners of their right of exclusion, thereby robbing them of much of their personal and physical protection.

Private property ought to be subservient to public uses, when necessity requires it; nevertheless, whenever any particular man's property is taken for the use of the public, the owner ought to receive an equivalent in money

The president and his right-wing Supreme Court think it is 'okay' to have the government take your house if they feel like putting a hotel where your house is.

You can't force someone to sell property in America.

The government now has license to transfer property from those with fewer resources to those with more. The Founders cannot have intended this perverse result.

The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.

The case decided on Thursday, though, seemed promising to takings fans because it wasn't about compensation. It was about the requirement that any government taking must have a 'public purpose.'

Our economic freedom is founded on individual property rights; government should never be permitted to take those away.

They can't take your house and give it to the mayor's mistress, even if they pay you for it. But they can, apparently, take your house and tear it down to make room for a development of trendy shops and restaurants, a hotel and so on.

I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.

Government is, by its very nature, a destroyer of liberties; the Obama administration, specifically, is promising to interfere with the economy and the health care system so profoundly that Washington will soon have us all in chains.

The rights of persons, and the rights of property, are the objects, for the protection of which Government was instituted.

When the good lord calls you home, the government ought not come get your home.

While Congress can't overturn the Supreme Court, we can provide carrots and sticks to prevent local governments from unfairly taking property from landowners.

One of the specific powers and responsibilities of the federal government is to secure the borders. Property can be taken with due process of law and just compensation.

At home, we must reject the mistaken notion - a notion that has dominated too much of the public dialogue for too long - that ever bigger Government is the answer to every problem.