Actually, I think I was wrong the Cadillac plant is still there and it only cost 1300 homes, 140 businesses, and 6 churches. The problem I have with the idea of emminent domain is the same one I have with much of American politics. Either party would abandon property rights for the "right" reasons. They just don't care that they're messing with the little guys and sometimes the medium guys lives. People plan and save and build dreams and a way of life but if the local gov can claim an increase in revenue they think you should go somewhere else. Maybe the politicians should be evicted and moved to communities more in line with their vision. :mad:

I read that as if you happen to be screwed by the politicians, you can have all the justice you can afford. Of course they have unlimited resources...your taxes....to fight you in court.
If you can afford to file suit, can they still take the property while it drags through the courts? Will the judges who play golf with the politicians stop them from taking it until the thing is settled? Even though the Supremes said your problem can be "confronted", does that guaranty you can get up through the courts to them? Providing your rich of course. But then if your rich they probably wouldn't be screwing you in the first place. :mad:

Well, Bruce, those were the court's words, not mine. Like I said, I am not for a second going to try to defend this whole right of the government to take whatever land catches its fancy. That little bit of land in blue grass country was sweet agricultual land. It was my grandparent's ticket out of the poverty of the Cumberland gap region, payed for in part by a loan from my grandmother's father who had a tiny country store back in Williamsburg, Kentucky. My father and my uncle Leland used to plow that land with a mule. The cash crop of tobacco it yielded was what my family counted on to get through the dark winters of the depression era. The Feds paid my grandparents half what that land was worth, and my grandparents bought another farm on less desirable, less productive land. My father and uncle would go out and shoot squirrels to put meat on the table after that. Me defend eminent domain? I don't think so! Those family stories are still vivid in my mind, even after all this time.