I'm a little late on this...

...but I'm not at all happy with the Supreme Court's ruling last week in Kelo v. New London.

According to the SCOTUSblog, the ruling said a government entity is within its constitutional rights to confiscate private property in order to allow profit-making private re-development, declaring that this constitutes a "public use" under the Constitution.

Justices John Paul Stevens, Stephen Breyer, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Anthony Kennedy — the five favorite justices of the nation's liberal wing — concurred in the affirmative, forcing seven families in New London, Conn. to sell their homes to the city to make way for offices, upscale condos, and a waterfront hotel. In essence, the city could get more in property taxes, jobs and aesthetic value from the new development than from the homeowners, so out they go.

This ruling should be distressing to anyone who accuses the Bush administration of favoring big corporations over the common folk, because this ruling does exactly that — it allows big corporations to sell a pretty picture to a city council in Anywhere, USA, and allows that city to remove any private property owner who gets in the way of that pretty picture. Big Corporation gets lots of revenue from selling the redeveloped property, Big City gets lots of revenue from the new taxes on the redeveloped property, and little homeowner gets nothing but a muncipal boot in the butt. Yes, the homeowner gets "just compensation" for the property, as the Fifth Amendment states — "private property (shall not) be taken for public use, without just compensation" — though I fail to see how "public use" includes private offices, hotels & condos. But "just compensation" isn't necessarily comforting for a family that has held its property for generations and intended for future generations to grow old there.

''The fallout from this decision will not be random," wrote Justice Sandra Day O'Connor in the dissent. ''The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms. . . . The government now has license to transfer property from those with fewer resources to those with more."

I like how Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe, noting how this ruling will disproportionately affect the poor, summed it up:

It isn't the high and mighty on whom avaricious governments and developers prey. Justices John Paul Stevens, Stephen Breyer, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Anthony Kennedy are responsible for this execrable decision. But they'll never have to live with its consequences.

Jacoby adds: "Would your town's tax base grow if your home were bulldozed and replaced with a parking garage? If so, it may not be your home for long."

Big Brother has always been interpreted as the government, with the judicial branch as the main roadblock to government intrusion. With this ruling, it seems the judicial branch has given government a free pass to not only stick its nose in our business, but to decide if it has more important things to do with it.