The Judgment Of Public Interest In Eminent Domain

According to the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, public interest is the primary requirement for the government to use eminent domain. What constitutes public interest has been one of the hot pots in Chinese legal scholars. Meanwhile, the problem is also being discussed in many countries.In the United States, the Fifth Amendment and state constitutions require that private property may only be taken for a"public use". In Kelo v. City of New London, the newest federal case about eminent domain, the Supreme Court used"public purpose"to interpret public use clause and fostered economic development was an appropriate use of the government's power of eminent domain. Besides, the Court retained the longstanding policy of deference to legislative judgments in this field.Why does the Court interpret"public use"in this way today? In US case law, the judgment of public use requirement has undergone three stages of development : strict scrutiny, co-existence of strict and flexible scrutiny, formed three"public use"standards: public ownership, use by the public and public purpose. Why do the courts of the United States apply different standards in different stages? The author analyses that in the stage of independence revolution, the Framers of the Constitution, influenced strongly by the concepts of natural law and individual property rights. The industrial revolution, however, marked the gradual erosion of property rights in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The birth of urban renewal efforts ushered in the current interpretation of the public use requirement. Since 1980s, considering all kinds of difficulties faced to local governments, the exercise of eminent domain solely for economic development has been upheld by US courts. In addition, US courts assume that the legislative decisions represent a true public consensus, the power of eminent domain within the police power. Furthermore, the Supreme Court enunciated that it would not review economic legislation under substantive due process analysis unless some special circumstances existed. For all the reasons above, US courts have complied with legislative judgments in decades.According to the history of US case law, we can recognize that the judgment of public interest is a very complex issue. We should study further on the problem of China.