Every instance of the use of eminent domain should be questioned by officials, staff and citizens and monitored to make sure that the agents of government are not breaching good faith with the citizens impacted.

With the exceptions of taking your life, injuring your person or taking away your liberty through incarceration, the confiscation of private property is the most severe action any government can take towards it citizens. When government uses condemnation to take real property this impacts the economic opportunity and financial situation of the citizens affected. It also can have a tremendous emotional impact as well which should be recognized by all representatives of government engaging in this process.

Because of this impact, and in the direct effort to openly discourage the confiscation of American property, our Founding Fathers adopted the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The amendments to the Constitution are known as the "Bill of Rights."

The Fifth Amendment states, "...nor shall private property be taken for Public Use, without just Compensation." This text is referred to in the media and in legal circles as both the “Takings Clause” and "Compensation Clause."

Why Compensation is Required and Vital to the Protection of Private Property Rights

There are many citizens who do not fully appreciate how important the requirement that compensation be paid to land owners is - or how savvy our Founders were for placing this mandate in the Fifth Amendment. The requirement that just compensation be paid is vital to restraining government's appetite for confiscating property from citizens, because government officials are restricted to only taking or confiscating property it can afford to pay for. While cynics today might point out that government can increase taxes or the federal treasury can print more money, this commonsense "check" on the power of government was sheer genius.

Kelo vs. New London: Proof The U.S. Supreme Court Is Fallible

As citizens, we believe in general that our nation’s highest court is made of highly educated and esteemed justices. On June 23, 2005, we also clearly learned that even our nations' highest court can err and render majority decisions which erode the protections of individual rights enshrined in our U.S. Constitution. In the now-infamous Kelo decision, five U.S. Supreme Court Justices ruled that it is acceptable for a faction of American government (in this case, the City of New London) to take private property for the purpose of transferring that property to another third party. Suzette Kelo, along with a group of fellow homeowners in New London fought the use of eminent domain when they learned the intended use - the construction of a Pfizer pharmaceutical plant and associated office buildings/"amenities" to this commercial complex. In their controversial 5-4 split decision, the majority of the Court sided with government and in doing so set a national case law precedent that eminent domain could be used for the broad public purpose of "economic development" and not a limited public use as intended by our Founding Fathers. This ruling opens the doors for government to take property for broader public purposes and not true public uses where government directly owns and controls the use of the property and the general public is the primary beneficiary. The Kelo decision should be repealed and CPR salutes the 4 Justices who strongly dissented in this ruling.

Florida property owners should note and take great pride in knowing that following this errant decision, CPR worked to educate lawmakers on the Kelo case and its Constitutional and economic ramifications.

With encouragement from CPR staff and members, with support by other property-minded organizations and the grassroots activism of individual citizens outraged by the idea that government can take property from one citizen and give it to another, we reformed Florida law. The statutory and constitutional reforms adopted by the Florida Legislature, signed by Governor Jeb Bush and adopted by statewide referendum by the people of Florida are considered among the strongest eminent domain reforms in the nation. Dozens of other states have pasted reforms aimed at similarly curtailing the abuse of eminent domain, to various degrees of success.

QUICK UPDATE: In May, 2010, CPR Executive Director Carol Saviak was featured in a national report by Fox News reporter Eric Shawn, as part of the "ITS YOUR LAND" series, in an eminent domain case in Auburn, NY, where land was being taken from property owners to be used for a private hotel because they were not protected by new state laws. New York State's elected Legislative and Gubernatorial leadership has not made the most basic protection of private property rights a priority. Following the negative media coverage, Auburn officials voted not to employ eminent domain.