Law Commons^™

Escaping Circularity: The Fourth Amendment And Property Law, João Marinotti

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Properties Of Intimacy, Emily J. Stolzenberg

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Value Of Title Insurance, Tom Hayden, Jordan Kelner

Journal of Business & Technology Law

No abstract provided.

Still Standing, Barely: Bank Of America Corp. V. City Of Miami And The Impact On Fair Lending Litigation, Trevor C, Hoffberger

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Murr-Ky Waters: How Murr V. Wisconsin Creates Uncertainty In Attempting To Answer The “Denominator Question”, Charles M. Kassir

Maryland Law Review Online

No abstract provided.

Disclaiming Property, Michael Pappas

Faculty Scholarship

Can Congress pick and choose when it must follow the Constitution? One would expect not, and yet the Supreme Court has allowed it to do so. In multiple statutory programs, Congress has disclaimed constitutional property protections for valuable interests that otherwise serve as property. The result is billions of dollars’ worth of “disclaimed property” that can be bought, sold, mortgaged, or leased, but that can also be revoked at any moment without due process or just compensation.

Disclaimed property already represents a great source of value, and property disclaimers are at the core of major recent policies ranging from natural …

The Influence Of Exile, Sara K. Rankin

Maryland Law Review

Belonging is a fundamental human need, but human instincts are Janus-faced and equally strong is the drive to exclude. This exclusive impulse, which this Article calls “the influence of exile,” reaches beyond interpersonal dynamics when empowered groups use laws and policies to restrict marginalized groups’ access to public space. Jim Crow, Anti-Okie, and Sundown Town laws are among many notorious examples. But the influence of exile perseveres today: it has found a new incarnation in the stigmatization and spatial regulation of visible poverty, as laws that criminalize and eject visibly poor people from public space proliferate across the nation. These …

Singled Out, Michael Pappas

Maryland Law Review

David has been “singled out.” He is the only one in his neighborhood legally prohibited from building a house. In a town full of residences, his lot alone must remain vacant. This is unequal, but is it unconstitutional?

Courts have continually grappled with this sort of question, vigilantly defending against unfair and unjust singling out. So important is this concern that the Supreme Court has emphasized it as the heart of the Fifth Amendment takings jurisprudence, and an entire Equal Protection doctrine has emerged around it.

However, courts and scholars have yet to critically examine the concept of singling-out, and …

The Use Of Eminent Domain For Economic Development In Baltimore, Maryland: Ten Years After Kelo, Elva E. Tillman

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Defining Power Property Expectations, Michael Pappas

Faculty Scholarship

To date, most government efforts to promote distributed solar energy have involved incentivizing property owners to undertake voluntary installations. However, that approach is changing, as government actors move to increase distributed solar generation capacity not only through incentive programs, but also through requirements. Such a change from voluntary to mandatory measures represents a seismic shift in the approach to encouraging distributed solar generation, and it may raise objections about interference with property expectations.

The Comment addresses those concerns by exploring the nature of property expectations in the energy context and analyzing how courts and legislatures have balanced property expectations against …

Reddall V. Bryan And The Role Of State Law In Federal Eminent Domain Jurisprudence, Shannon Frede

Legal History Publications

Prior to 1875, the standard federal takings procedure had been for state governments to condemn property on behalf of the federal government. As a result, the majority of interpretative work in the early history of eminent domain jurisprudence was undertaken by state courts. In 1853, the Maryland General Assembly granted the United States Government the power to condemn land in Maryland for an aqueduct across the Potomac to supply water to two District cities. In Reddall v. Bryan, the Maryland Court of Appeals upheld the aqueduct supplying the city of Washington with water as a public use. The Court …

Baltimore V. Valsamaki: The Maryland Court Of Appeals' Response To Kelo, Jeff Shaw

Legal History Publications

In the years following the Supreme Court’s controversial decision in Kelo v. New London, state judges and legislators across the country responded with a tidal wave of reform to state eminent domain law. While legislative reform efforts largely floundered in the Maryland General Assembly, the Maryland Court of Appeals, in the case of Baltimore v. Valsamaki, curbed the City of Baltimore’s use of quick-take condemnation procedures, imposed additional planning requirements on condemning authorities, and emphasizing the fact that property rights are fundamental constitutional rights. This article will begin with an examination of quick-take procedures and the reasons why …

Public Takings By The State For Private Use: A Maryland Case Study In Georges Creek Coal & Iron Company V. New Central Coal Company (1871-1874), Joshua T. Carback

Legal History Publications

This paper examines the legal controversy concerning New Central Company’s attempt to execute a public taking of the land of the Georges Creek Coal and Iron Company for its private use to build a railroad. This paper analyzes the significance of the case within the social, economic, and political context of the town of Lonaconing in Allegany County, Western Maryland, where the parties were situated. This paper also traces the procedural history of the case, including its appearance before the Allegany Circuit Court in 1872, and before the Maryland Court of Appeals in 1873 and 1874. Finally, this paper presents …

Great Falls Mfg. Co. V. Garland, 124 U.S. 581 (1888): The Final Battle After Thirty Years Of Litigation Over The Rights To Great Falls On The Potomac, Julia Carbonetti

Legal History Publications

The Great Falls Manufacturing Company owned extensive land and water rights at the Great Falls on the Potomac River at the time the United States decided to use the Great Falls as a water supply to the new capital in the City of Washington. In order to use its power of eminent domain, the federal government passed two Acts between 1858 and 1888. During that time, the United States and the Great Falls Manufacturing Company pursued 30 years of litigation to argue the just compensation that was due for the property taken at Great Falls. The 30 years ended in …

Hungry In The “Land Of Pleasant Living”: Combating The Effects Of Baltimore’S Food Deserts On Childhood Education Through Eminent Domain, Gabriel H. Rubinstein

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

The Informal Property Rights Of Boomerang Children In The Home, Shelly Kreiczer-Levy

Maryland Law Review

Adult children living with their parents represent an increasingly common social phenomenon in the United States that challenges the boundaries of both the family and formal property rights. What is the legal status of adult children living with their parents? Do parents have any additional duties when they rescind permission for their child to live with them? Property and family scholars have not addressed this important issue. This Article fills the void. Instead of treating people who live together as strangers, owing no legal obligations to one another, I argue that under certain conditions living with others creates a property …

Requiem For Regulation, Garrett Power

Faculty Scholarship

This comment reviews U.S. Supreme Court decisions over the past 100 years which have considered the constitutional limitations on governmental powers. It finds that at the three-quarter mark of the 20th century, a remarkable set of Court precedents had swollen the regulatory powers of governments while shrinking private rights to property and contract. But since the Reagan years, a more conservative Court has undertaken to curtail governmental activity in general, and to limit federal, state, and local planning in particular. A number of 5-4 decisions expanded private property rights and contracted the scope of the federal “commerce power.” The comment …

Anti-Waste, Michael Pappas

Faculty Scholarship

It may be a bad idea to waste resources, but is it illegal? Legally speaking, what does “waste” even mean? Though the concept may appear completely subjective, this Article builds a framework for understanding how the law identifies and addresses waste.

Drawing upon property and natural resource doctrines, the Article finds that the law selects from a menu of five specific, and sometimes competing, societal values to define waste. The values are: 1) economic efficiency, 2) human flourishing, 3) concern for future generations, 4) stability and consistency, and 5) ecological concerns. The law recognizes waste in terms of one or …

Baltimore After The War Of 1812: Where Robert Mills Met His Waterloo And When James A. Buchanan Broke The Bank, Garrett Power

Faculty Scholarship

In 1815 Baltimore City was boom town. Its militiamen had repulsed the British sea invasion and presaged an end to the War of 1812. Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo in 1815 signaled an end to European wars. Freedom of the seas had been restored. The Baltimore “Clipper” was the best sailing ship on the ocean. Baltimore looked to become the country’s leading exporter of grain, flour, and tobacco. Merchant James A. Buchanan, a partner in one of the country’s greatest shipping firms, had been named President of the Baltimore Branch of the Second National Bank of the United States. Civic leaders …

Property Rights, The "Gang Of Four" & The Fifth Vote: Stop The Beach From Renourishment, Inc. V. Florida Department Of Environmental Protection (U.S. Supreme Court 2010), Garrett Power

Faculty Scholarship

In 2010 The U.S. Supreme Court decided the case of Stop the Beach Renourishment v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection (SBR v. Fla. EPA). Justice Antonin Scalia announced the judgment of the Court. All Justices agreed that Florida had not violated the Takings Clause of the Federal Constitution’s Fifth Amendment. But then in a plurality opinion Justice Scalia joined by the Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Thomas and Alito proposed profound changes in the law of “regulatory takings.” As the spokesman for the Court’s property rights absolutists Scalia advanced two novel legal propositions. First he argued that federal courts …

Maryland Foreclosure Mediation - Working Or Waning? A Critical Look At The State's Foreclosure Mediation Program, Chelsea Jones

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

The Origin And Civil Law Foundation Of The Community Property System, Why California Adopted It And Why Community Property Principles Benefit Women, Caroline Bermeo Newcombe

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

The Internet Is A Semicommons, James Grimmelmann

Faculty Scholarship

The Internet is a semicommons. Private property in servers and network links coexists with a shared communications platform. This distinctive combination both explains the Internet's enormous success and illustrates some of its recurring problems.

Building on Henry Smith's theory of the semicommons in the medieval open-field system, this essay explains how the dynamic interplay between private and common uses on the Internet enables it to facilitate worldwide sharing and collaboration without collapsing under the strain of misuse. It shows that key technical features of the Internet, such as its layering of protocols and the Web's division into distinct "sites," respond …

Cutting The Gordian Knot: The Case For Allowing Modification Of Home Mortgages In Bankruptcy, Susan E. Hauser

Journal of Business & Technology Law

No abstract provided.

Fraud Is Fun: Or How A Foreclosure Rescue Scam Changed My Life, Peter A. Holland

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Putting Community Equity In Community Development: Resident Equity Participation In Urban Redevelopment, Barbara Bezdek

Faculty Scholarship

The special concern of this paper is to recalibrate the benefits and burdens of public-private partnerships as they remake inner city neighborhoods, by braking the rate at which urban land is being reclaimed from low-wealth residents by local government practices to disperse occupants, sweeping aside their tangible and intangible capital. Public oversight requirements have not kept pace with the dispossession, yet the costs that these development decisions impose on the social fabric of communities rend the shared networks necessary to residents’ abilities to meet basic social needs. This destruction of low-wealth communities is a form of equity-stripping, produced by local …

The Background Principles And Core Contents Of The Real Right Law Of The People's Republic Of China, Zhu Yan

Maryland Series in Contemporary Asian Studies

No abstract provided.

Regulatory Takings: A Chronicle Of The Construction Of A Constitutional Concept, Garrett Power

Faculty Scholarship

In the American constitutional system the sovereign has the power to enact “regulations which are necessary to the common good and general welfare.” But the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution proscribes that : “No person shall be . . . deprived of . . . property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” And the question of whether a sovereign regulation has “taken” private property without just compensation has puzzled the United States Supreme Court for over two hundred years in over four hundred cases. This paper chronicles …

Eminent Domain: A Legal And Economic Critique, Nadia E. Nedzel, Walter Block

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

The Robin Hood Antithesis – Robbing From The Poor To Give To The Rich: How Eminent Domain Is Used To Take Property In Violation Of The Fifth Amendment, Daniel C. Orlaskey

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.