by
Laura Adelmann
Government has many legal schemes allowing it to brazenly disregard
citizens’ constitutional right to the pursuit of happiness.
For
example, under “official mapping” or “future land use mapping,” government
holds property owners hostage until it gets around to taking their land.
The process allows governmental bodies to identify privately-owned parcels
it plans to acquire for things like future roads, buildings or parks.
Under the
official mapping designation government essentially bookmarks a property’s
market value, because use of it is greatly diminished. A landowner must
beg permission from the official-map-wielding governmental unit to make
any improvement on their own property.
The
request is virtually guaranteed to be turned down, because by denying the
landowner his property rights, government can control its future costs for
acquiring the property. In contrast, permitting an improvement forces
government to actually pay the owner for the property’s increased value
when it acts to own the land.
Of
course, the owner could make an improvement without a permit, but there
are consequences for such an action.
With the map in place, government will not have to pay for the
improvement, and can even force the owner to remove it at their own
expense.
But take
heart: In a great act of benevolence, government grants the property
“owner” the privilege of paying taxes on the parcel until ready to take it
off the owner’s hands for its “fair” market value.
Under
another program, property rights are so little valued or understood that
people sell them off forever. Conservation easements are welcomed by
many environmentalists, farmers and open-space lovers around the country
as a way to preserve land from development.
A
conservation easement restricts or eliminates a property’s use. By selling
a conservation easement, a property owner becomes merely a fee-owner, and
is typically paid less than the property’s value (as a donation) to sign
away most, if not all, rights to develop or change the property. Although
the property owner also receives what can be considerable tax breaks,
control of the property is forever lost to a third party, usually the
government or an environmental group. Control of the conservation
easement, and thus what is allowed to be done on the property, can change
over time without the owner’s consent.
Property
rights experts warn these easements reduce land owners to subservient
tenants, leaving them and future fee-title owners financially responsible
for property taxes, upkeep and the projects deemed necessary by the
easement-holder. Forever, into subsequent generations, the fee-title
owners are at risk of being regulated completely out of their property.
Complicated contracts and public/private financing schemes are usually a
hallmark of conservation easements, many involving Socialistic
public/private “partnerships.” Government at all levels promotes
conservation easements and commits millions of the people's dollars to
purchasing property rights.
Last
year, U.S. Natural Resource Conversation Service Chief Bruce Knight made a
speech, calling conservation easements a way for his agency to “partner”
with local governments to preserve land. “This is not a matter of a
federal agency coming in and acquiring property,” he said at a program in
Minnesota last April during which he presented $1.2 million for purchasing
easements.
Maybe
conservation easements are better understood — not as an outright taking
property — but erosion of the people’s independence and power through
ownership.
Dan
Byfield, president of the American Land Foundation explained restricting a
property’s use greatly reduces its value. Considering the single
biggest investment the average American will make in their lifetime is
their home, selling property rights leaves a 30-year mortgage nearly
without value. And without that equity, it is considerably more difficult
to pay for college or open new businesses; it is a lifeline that could be
lost if a family finds themselves faced with a serious illness or other
financial crisis.
Indeed,
Republican Congressman Richard Pombo of California had it right when in a
press release he called property rights “the heart of individual freedom
and the foundation for all other civil rights guaranteed to Americans by
the Constitution.” In the Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engles state, “The
theory of Communism may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of
private property.”
Thus, property rights are the barrier between freedom or tyranny. Under
America’s Constitution, our Founders set out to protect the people from
government control. As property rights diminish, government grows
stronger.
Nowhere
has that been seen more clearly as last summer’s astounding U.S. Supreme
Court decision allowing government to transfer ownership for an increased
tax base. Kelo v. New London outraged many, and spurred our
representatives to propose legislation in attempts to control governmental
takings.
Jan. 24,
the Washington Farm Bureau filed an initiative to require governments to
consider how a taking could impact a land owner’s ability to use their own
property before taking action. To get its Property Fairness Initiative on
November’s ballot, the Bureau is working to gather the required 235,000
signatures.
While I enthusiastically applaud the bureau’s
efforts, it falls a little short. Government should be forced to not only
consider property owner rights, but actively respect them. As said John
Locke, “I have no reason to suppose that he, who would take away my
liberty, would not when he had me in his power, take away everything
else.”
Discuss
this article
Laura Adelmann is a Staff Writer for the
New Media Alliance.
She is an award-winning investigative reporter and researcher who stands
for the conservative Christian values that founded America. She has a
passion for truth, integrity and accuracy, as well as a love of research.
Her work, which includes news articles, investigative stories and opinion
pieces, has appeared in Minnesota Christian Chronicle, Pro-Family News and
numerous local newspapers in Dakota County, Minnesota. Laura has also
written copy for conservative candidates running for state and national
offices. You can reach her at
ladelmann@thenma.org.
The opinions expressed in
this column represent those of the author and do not necessarily reflect
the opinions, views, or philosophy of TheRealityCheck.org
