https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/4192662/posts
A Texas farmer’s fight for justice could have major implications for property rights
By Jon Miltimore — October 26, 2023 09:44 AM
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In the 1930s, Richie DeVillier’s grandfather purchased a farm in Winnie, a little town in eastern Texas named after a railroad contractor who prospered.
For nearly a century, the DeVillier family raised cattle and grew crops on the 900-acre property without incident — until the Texas Department of Transportation started a highway project that had serious implications for DeVillier’s land.
In the early 2000s, the state renovated Interstate 10, elevating and broadening the highway and erecting concrete barriers. The construction trapped the DeVillier property, turning his farm into a lake whenever the region experienced heavy rains, as it did in 2017 during Hurricane Harvey.
“The water started to rise on August 28,” DeVillier recalled . “Our home was completely flooded by August 29.”
When DeVillier says his “home,” he’s not talking about just his house. Video footage shows his entire farm submerged, with cows standing chest-deep in water; fields where the family once grew rice and olives can be seen totally flooded.
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In November, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit punted on the matter, arguing that federal courts have no jurisdiction in takings cases against states. (A “taking” isn’t necessarily seizing the property; an action that substantially alters a property is legally defined as a taking in tort law.)
The court didn’t rule against DeVillier. It simply said that Congress never passed a law allowing Americans to sue states for taking their property, so the Fifth Amendment’s property protections do not apply to DeVillier or anyone else.
The court’s reasoning is strange. Not only does the Constitution explicitly state that no person shall be “deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law … [or] without just compensation,” but the high court weighed in on this issue as recently as 2019.
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“If there is one basic principle in property law, it’s the Pottery Barn Rule: You break it, you buy it,” said Robert McNamara, an attorney for the Institute for Justice who is representing the family. “The Fifth Circuit’s decision in this case amounts to ‘you pay if you feel like it.’”
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That the government, which was created to secure these rights, has become the single greatest transgressor of human rights is a sad irony, one that was not lost on the 19th-century economist Frederic Bastiat, who described it as a “perversion.”
Few know this better than Richie DeVillier, whom the state of Texas is trying to stiff after destroying his farm.
Fortunately, the Supreme Court has a chance to make amends. If it does, it will not just be a win for DeVillier. It will be a win for justice.
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I like that summation — the Pottery Barn Rule. In this case, the Gooferment “robbed this family blind”!
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