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ALI Nashville 2020

The final agenda and faculty list will soon be officially published, but we wanted to give you a preview of what is in store at the ALI-CLE Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Litigation Conference, January 23-25, 2020, at the Nashville Hilton (downtown, just a few steps away from everything that Nashville has to offer). 

Don’t miss out: in recent years, we’ve been at-or-near capacity, and the conference hotel has even sold out a couple of times. Visit the ALI-CLE website to register and hold your space. 

Here are some of the things we’ll be discussing: 

  • Making Sense of the New Rules After Knick v. Township of Scott: Where Do I Go, What Do I Do?
  • The Missing Link in Valuing Fixtures
  • When a River Runs Through it: Water Rights and Takings
  • Responding to Project Changes: Valuation When Government Action is Ongoing
  • Property Rights as Civil Rights: Seeking Justice Through

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Continue Reading Get Ready: The 2020 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain And Land Valuation Litigation Conference Agenda Coming Soon

Here’s what we are reading this Tuesday:

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Continue Reading Tuesday Takings Round-Up: Alien Takings; Zombies; Kelo, Philippines-Style; Kafka

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We’re about to get underway with the fall semester at William and Mary Law School, where we’re again teaching an upper-division course, Eminent Domain and Property Rights. 

We’ve more than doubled the size of last year’s enrollment, so it looks like the word is getting out. We cover not only eminent domain and just compensation, but takings (yes, we have a lot of new materials to cover there), civil forfeiture, a small bit of crossover with land use, local government, and related, property rights as civil rights, how property law is discussed in the public sphere, due process, and how to lawyer up these cases. And in early October, the opportunity to have some of the nation’s best property law scholars “guest lecture” during the Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Conference. Here’s the official description:

Property rights and the sovereign’s power of eminent domain have been essential components of…

Continue Reading Law 608: Eminent Domain And Property Rights – Season 2

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Don’t worry, you didn’t miss the U.S. Supreme Court issuing a major eminent domain case. Today’s post is about a decidedly older decision, Danforth v. United States, 308 U.S. 271 (1939). 

The reason we’re posting this decision now, eighty years after it was issued, is that a colleague recently passed on a note with a cite to the case. So we dusted off the opinion and read it (again). And when we did, this quote stuck out:

“Condemnation is a means by which the sovereign may find out what any piece of property will cost.”

Id. at 284.

The case involved a straight taking (not quick take). The question was when the “taking” actually takes place in such a case, and whether interest is due if the condemnor pays 100% of the adjudicated compensation when it is owed. The Court held:

Unless a taking has occurred previously in actuality…

Continue Reading “Condemnation is a means by which the sovereign may find out what any piece of property will cost.”

Recently, we requested crowdsourcing of this year’s “come to the ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference video.” Instead of doing the video ourselves, we asked folks to “please send a short clip of you and/or your colleagues telling us why you think the Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Litigation Conference is the place to be in January. Humor welcome, but not required.”

Our friend and colleague, St. Louis’ Paul Henry, has answered the call, admirably. Paul, as you may remember, is famous for his presentation a couple of years ago at the Conference about “Everything About Eminent Domain I Need To Know I Learned From Star Trek.” Which he gave in a Starfleet captain’s uniform. Brave man. Readers know that we dig Star Trek. But we are not that brave, so bravo, Paul.  

See if you don’t agree that Paul has now raised the video bar. …

Continue Reading Capt Henry Orders You To Boldly Go To The 2020 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain And Land Valuation Litigation Conference, Nashville, Jan. 23-25, 2020

Leave it to Federal Circuit Judge Timothy Dyk — who, as far as we can tell, has never once ruled against the government in a takings case — to conclude that the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent opinion in Knick v. Township of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162 (2019) actually works to the detriment of property owners when it comes to the statute of limitations applicable to regulatory takings claims. 

In Campbell v. United States, No. 18-2014 (Aug. 1, 2019), the plaintiffs alleged that it was a taking when their product liability tort claims against General Motors were extinguished by GM’s bankruptcy. The CFC held that the claims were barred by the six-year statute of limitations, and the Federal Circuit agreed. 

Here’s the specifics of the plaintiffs’ claim:

Relying on A & D [Auto Sales, Inc. v. United States, 748 F.3d 1142 (Fed. Cir. 2014)], on July…

Continue Reading Fed Cir: File Your Regulatory Takings Claims Early (And Often?). The Statute Of Limitations Starts Running Before The Impacts Of The Regulation Are Felt

Usually, when we’re scanning the daily email from the Federal Circuit for takings decisions of interest, we look for “United States” as the defendant, and our eyes glaze over the other cases on the court’s docket such as patent matters. But today, we were rewarded: a takings issue in a patent matter.

In Celgene Corp. v. Peter, No. 18-1167 (July 30, 2019), the court concluded that the invalidation of an issued patent via inter partes review was not a taking. This issue was ripened by the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Oil States, which noted that patents may be “property for purposes of the Due Process Clause or the Takings Clause.” 

Celgene obtained patents for “a system to safely distribute thalidomide to patients.” Slip op. at 4. The Coalition for Affordable Drugs objected, and sought inter partes review, which according to the USPTO is, “a trial proceeding…

Continue Reading Fed Cir: Inter Partes Reexamination Of Patents Isn’t A Taking

The Land Use Committee of the ABA’s Section of State and Local Government Law is sponsoring a free (for Section members) informal webinar about the latest in takings law:

Knick Picking Regulatory Takings: Did the Court Right a Wrong, or Wrong a Right?

Friday, July 26 | 2 – 2:30pm ET

Here’s hoping you can join us for a half hour on the 5-4 SCOTUS decision in Knick v. Township of Scott (June 21, 2019). Knick overruled the 34-year-old precedent in Williamson County requiring that federal takings claimants seek compensation in state court before being allowed to proceed in federal court.

Presenters Dwight Merriam and Robert Thomas will discuss reaction to the decision — which has been as divided as the Court. Was this the conservative justices having their way? Is it a right versus left issue? Did that baby, stare decisis, get thrown out with the old ripeness bathwater?

Continue Reading Upcoming Webinar – Knick Picking Regulatory Takings: Did the Court Right a Wrong, or Wrong a Right? (free for State and Local Govt Law Land Use Committee members)

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I am grateful that planning chairs Justin Hodge and Jeremy Baker invited me to their conference. A room full of experts. Here are the links to the cases and other items I spoke about:

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Continue Reading Cases And Links From Today’s Eminent Domain And Pipelines Conference (Houston)