Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff
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| Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff | |||||||||||||
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 Supreme Court of the United States |
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| Argued March 26, 1984 Decided May 30, 1984 |
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| Holding | |||||||||||||
| The state can use eminent domain powers to redistribute concentrated property ownership to a larger group of people. | |||||||||||||
| Court membership | |||||||||||||
| Chief Justice: Warren E. Burger Associate Justices: William J. Brennan, Byron White, Thurgood Marshall, Harry Blackmun, Lewis Franklin Powell, Jr., William Rehnquist, John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor |
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| Case opinions | |||||||||||||
| Majority by: O'Connor Joined by: unanimous court Marshall took no part in the consideration or decision of the case. |
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Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff, 467 U.S. 229 (1984), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court held that a state could use the eminent domain process to take land overwhelmingly concentrated in the hands of private landowners, and redistribute it to the larger population.
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[edit] Background
After extensive hearings in the mid-1960s, the Hawaii legislature discovered that while the State and Federal Governments owned nearly 49% of the State’s land, another 47% was in the hands of only 72 private landowners. Concentration of land ownership was so dramatic that on the State’s most urbanized island, Oahu, 22 landowners owned 72.5% of the fee simple titles. The Hawaii Legislature had concluded that the oligopoly in land ownership was “skewing the State’s residential fee simple market, inflating land prices, and injuring the public tranquility and welfare,” and therefore enacted a condemnation scheme for redistributing title.
[edit] Decision
The court's decision looked to Berman v. Parker, which used eminent domain power to redevelop slum areas and for the possible sale or lease of the condemned lands for private interest. Congress had the power to determine what was for the public good over the judiciary. The decision equated police power with the eminent domain of the sovereign's public use requirement.
In an 8-0 decision the court voted that the Hawaiian act was constitutional. Hawaii's act to regulate the oligopoly was seen as a classic exercise of the State's police powers, and a comprehensive and rational approach to identifying and correcting market failure and satisfied the public use doctrine. Land did not have to be put into actual public use in order to use eminent domain. It is the taking's purpose, and not its mechanics that were important. Here, eminent domain was used to provide an overall market benefit.
The decision suggested that a judicial deference to the legislator was involved. If the legislature determines there are substantial reasons for the exercise of the taking power, courts must defer to the legislature's determination that the taking will serve a public use.
The decision held that the takings to correct concentrated property ownership was a legitimate public purpose.
[edit] Limitations of the decision
The decision though placed limits on the power of the government citing:
- "A purely private taking could not withstand the scrutiny of the public use requirement; it would serve no legitimate purpose of government and would thus be void... The Court's cases have repeatedly stated that 'one person's property may not be taken for the benefit of another private person without a justifying public purpose, even though compensation be paid.’ "
Midkiff was basically reaffirmed by Kelo v. City of New London but some believe that this limitation was overturned.
