On Consumerism: The saga of eminent domain

Suppose you are a homeowner and quite happy living where you are.

Can you be forced to sell your home – at a price determined solely by the buyer – and have to move out against your will?

The answer is yes.

Even if you fully own your home – no mortgage to pay off – you can still be forced to sell and vacate, regardless of your opinion of the buying price or whether you would prefer to live out your days where you are.

This compulsory vacating of one’s home is called eminent domain.

It’s a process by which government is authorized to take private property for public use, with payment of compensation to the owner.

The idea – or at least the term – dates back to the 1730s.

However, the way it is used leaves the homeowner unable to have a say in compensation and unable to decline. Also, it leaves the government in charge of determining what is “public use.”

This is how land was acquired for many of our interstate highways.

My first observation of eminent domain was when New London, Connecticut, wanted a private developer to take over some properties and create a shopping center. Susette Kelo, a homeowner in one of the properties, did not want to sell. But the city – not the federal government or a state, but a city – insisted it needed the land. To build a shopping center. Yup, one more shopping center. A so-called vital need for the masses.

So the city used eminent domain to condemn the building and acquire it, for purposes of economic development. Kelo wasn’t the only one to fight back, but she was the lead plaintiff. The case reached the Supreme Court, which issued its verdict on June 23, 2005. By a 5-4 margin, the Court voted in favor of the city. Kelo lost her home.

The Court didn’t say this was a commendable use of eminent domain, merely that it was an allowable use.

The city then showed its disregard for the losing plaintiffs by trying to collect back rent for the years the case had been in litigation.

Oh, 16 years later, the shopping center still hasn’t been built. The developer did not follow through on the original plans. The city relocated Kelo’s condemned house, and it still stands, unoccupied. The lot where the house formerly stood was never developed. It was empty until Hurricane Irene came along in 2011, at which point the lot was used as a dumping ground for storm debris.

Personally, I see some need for the federal government to have eminent domain powers, if used sparingly. I’m less certain that state governments should have the power. I’m adamant that local governments should not have that power.

Nevertheless, this is one of the few things in government that Democrats and Republicans agree on – the availability of eminent domain as a government tool. They might disagree on what constitutes desirable public use or public need, but neither party will hesitate to grab your land and evict you, after paying you what it decides is just compensation.

Now let’s revisit one of the worst race massacres in 20th century America. The last day or two of May and the first day of June 1921 was a nightmare for Blacks living in the Greenwood section of Tulsa, Oklahoma. The predominantly Black neighborhood had been prospering, until it was looted and burned – more than a thousand homes and businesses burned, with only one or two buildings spared – by arrogant White thugs who also looted and killed. About 300 people were killed and thousands were left homeless. The violent perpetrators were never prosecuted.

The destruction began in the final hour or two of May 30, 1921. Before that, the Greenwood neighborhood was so prosperous that Booker T. Washington dubbed it “Negro Wall Street.” It was a compliment. Greenwood boasted among the country’s highest Black literacy rates, and its high school graduation rate topped 50% – which back then was good for any neighborhood, Black or White.

But Greenwood rebuilt. This was not easy. Despite the desire by some to give the community money for reparations, the White officials in charge of Tulsa decided against it. Insurance companies (in my opinion, falsely) called it a race riot, thus absolving themselves from having to pay off on the destroyed buildings. The Red Cross, however, recognized the disaster for what it was and helped. By the end of 1921, about 760 buildings destroyed in the massacre had been rebuilt.

Kudos to the residents of Greenwood for rebuilding after its bigoted destruction. But nothing could help them against a later attack – from eminent domain. A plan drafted in 1957 called for U.S. 75 to replace a dozen blocks of mostly Black-owned businesses along Lansing Avenue; plus, more than half of Greenwood Avenue, which included the 750-seat Dreamwood Theatre, was torn out to make way for Interstate 244.

Didn’t matter if the owners wanted to sell or not. They had to leave.

Almost everything that was rebuilt after the 1921 massacre was lost. Again.

This time, permanently.

That is eminent domain.

Arthur Vidro’s “EQMM Goes to College” appears in the May/June 2021 issue of Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine.