Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council

LUCAS v. SOUTH CAROLINA COASTAL COUNCIL

“CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF SOUTH CAROLINA”

“No. 91-453. Argued March 2, 1992 — Decided June 29, 1992”

Disposition: “304 S. C. 376, 404 S. E. 2d 895, reversed and remanded.”

Opinion of the Court by Mr. Justice Scalia. Justice Kennedy concurring in the judgment, at 505 U.S. 1032. Justice Blackmun dissenting, at 505 U.S. 1036. Justice Stevens dissenting, at 505 U.S. 1061. Statement of Justice Souter, at 505 U.S. 1076.

Metadata verified and corrected under Authority Library § 09.4: the separate statement of Justice Souter — who would have dismissed the writ as improvidently granted, and whose separate writing is neither a concurrence nor a dissent — was absent from the prior record. Its precise character as a “Statement of JUSTICE SOUTER” is as published in the bound volume.

[505 U.S. 1003] “In 1986, petitioner Lucas bought two residential lots on a South Carolina barrier island, intending to build single-family homes such as those on the immediately adjacent parcels. At that time, Lucas's lots were not subject to the State's coastal zone building permit requirements. In 1988, however, the state legislature enacted the Beachfront Management Act, which barred Lucas from erecting any permanent habitable structures on his parcels.”

[505 U.S. 1003] “The state trial court agreed, finding that the ban rendered Lucas's parcels ‘valueless,’ and entered an award exceeding $1.2 million. In reversing, the State Supreme Court held itself bound, in light of Lucas's failure to attack the Act's validity, to accept the legislature's ‘uncontested . . . findings’ that new construction in the coastal zone threatened a valuable public resource. The court ruled that, under the Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U. S. 623, line of cases, when a regulation is designed to prevent ‘harmful or noxious uses’ of property akin to public nuisances, no compensation is owing under the Takings Clause regardless of the regulation's effect on the property's value.”

[505 U.S. 1003] “Held: 1. Lucas's takings claim is not rendered unripe by the fact that he may yet be able to secure a special permit to build on his property under an amendment to the Act passed after briefing and argument before the State Supreme Court, but prior to issuance of that court's opinion. . . . Pp. 1010-1014.”

[505 U.S. 1004] “2. The State Supreme Court erred in applying the ‘harmful or noxious uses’ principle to decide this case. Pp. 1014-1032.”

[505 U.S. 1004] “(a) Regulations that deny the property owner all ‘economically viable use of his land’ constitute one of the discrete categories of regulatory deprivations that require compensation without the usual case-specific inquiry into the public interest advanced in support of the restraint. Although the Court has never set forth the justification for this categorical rule, the practical — and economic — equivalence of physically appropriating and eliminating all beneficial use of land counsels its preservation. Pp. 1014-1019.”

[505 U.S. 1004] “(b) A review of the relevant decisions demonstrates that the ‘harmful or noxious use’ principle was merely this Court's early formulation of the police power justification necessary to sustain (without compensation) any regulatory diminution in value; that the distinction between regulation that ‘prevents harmful use’ and that which ‘confers benefits’ is difficult, if not impossible, to discern on an objective, value-free basis; and that, therefore, noxious-use logic cannot be the basis for departing from this Court's categorical rule that total regulatory takings must be compensated. Pp. 1020-1026.”

[505 U.S. 1004] “(c) Rather, the question must turn, in accord with this Court's ‘takings’ jurisprudence, on citizens' historic understandings regarding the content of, and the State's power over, the ‘bundle of rights’ that they acquire when they take title to property. . . . However, no compensation is owed — in this setting as with all takings claims — if the State's affirmative decree simply makes explicit what already inheres in the title itself, in the restrictions that background principles of the State's law of property and nuisance already place upon land ownership. Pp. 1027-1031.”

[505 U.S. 1004] “(d) Although it seems unlikely that common-law principles would have prevented the erection of any habitable or productive improvements on Lucas's land, this state-law question must be dealt with on remand. To win its case, respondent cannot simply proffer the legislature's declaration that the uses Lucas desires are inconsistent with the public interest, or the conclusory assertion that they violate a common-law maxim such as sic utere tuo ut alienum non laedas, but must identify background principles of nuisance and property law that prohibit the uses Lucas now intends in the property's present circumstances. P. 1031.”

[505 U.S. 1015] “Nevertheless, our decision in Mahon offered little insight into when, and under what circumstances, a given regulation would be seen as going ‘too far’ for purposes of the Fifth Amendment. In 70-odd years of succeeding ‘regulatory takings’ jurisprudence, we have generally eschewed any ‘‘set formula’’ for determining how far is too far, preferring to ‘engag[e] in . . . essentially ad hoc, factual inquiries.’ Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S. 104, 124 (1978).”

[505 U.S. 1015] “We have, however, described at least two discrete categories of regulatory action as compensable without case-specific inquiry into the public interest advanced in support of the restraint. The first encompasses regulations that compel the property owner to suffer a physical ‘invasion’ of his property. In general (at least with regard to permanent invasions), no matter how minute the intrusion, and no matter how weighty the public purpose behind it, we have required compensation.”

[505 U.S. 1015] “The second situation in which we have found categorical treatment appropriate is where regulation denies all economically beneficial or productive use of land.”

[505 U.S. 1016] “As we have said on numerous occasions, the Fifth Amendment is violated when land-use regulation ‘does not substantially advance legitimate state interests or denies an owner economically viable use of his land.’ Agins, supra, at 260 (citations omitted) (emphasis added).”

[505 U.S. 1027] “Where the State seeks to sustain regulation that deprives land of all economically beneficial use, we think it may resist compensation only if the logically antecedent inquiry into the nature of the owner's estate shows that the proscribed use interests were not part of his title to begin with. This accords, we think, with our ‘takings’ jurisprudence, which has traditionally been guided by the understandings of our citizens regarding the content of, and the State's power over, the ‘bundle of rights’ that they acquire when they obtain title to property.”

[505 U.S. 1027] “It seems to us that the property owner necessarily expects the uses of his property to be restricted, from time to time, by various measures newly enacted by the State in legitimate exercise of its police powers; ‘[a]s long recognized, some values are enjoyed under an implied limitation and must yield to the police power.’ Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U. S., at 413.”

[505 U.S. 1028] “In the case of land, however, we think the notion pressed by the Council that title is somehow held subject to the ‘implied limitation’ that the State may subsequently eliminate all economically valuable use is inconsistent with the historical compact recorded in the Takings Clause that has become part of our constitutional culture.”

[505 U.S. 1029] “We believe similar treatment must be accorded confiscatory regulations, i. e., regulations that prohibit all economically beneficial use of land: Any limitation so severe cannot be newly legislated or decreed (without compensation), but must inhere in the title itself, in the restrictions that background principles of the State's law of property and nuisance already place upon land ownership. A law or decree with such an effect must, in other words, do no more than duplicate the result that could have been achieved in the courts — by adjacent landowners (or other uniquely affected persons) under the State's law of private nuisance, or by the State under its complementary power to abate nuisances that affect the public generally, or otherwise.”

[505 U.S. 1029] “On this analysis, the owner of a lakebed, for example, would not be entitled to compensation when he is denied the requisite permit to engage in a landfilling operation that would have the effect of flooding others' land. Nor the corporate owner of a nuclear generating plant, when it is directed to remove all improvements from its land upon discovery that the plant sits astride an earthquake fault.”

[505 U.S. 1030] “The use of these properties for what are now expressly prohibited purposes was always unlawful, and (subject to other constitutional limitations) it was open to the State at any point to make the implication of those background principles of nuisance and property law explicit.”

[505 U.S. 1032] “The judgment is reversed, and the case is remanded for proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. So ordered.”

[505 U.S. 1032] “The case comes to the Court in an unusual posture, as all my colleagues observe. . . . After the suit was initiated but before it reached us, South Carolina amended its Beachfront Management Act to authorize the issuance of special permits at variance with the Act's general limitations. . . . Petitioner has not applied for a special permit but may still do so. The availability of this alternative, if it can be invoked, may dispose of petitioner's claim of a permanent taking.”

[505 U.S. 1032] “As I read the Court's opinion, it does not decide the permanent taking claim, but neither does it foreclose the Supreme Court of South Carolina from considering the claim or requiring petitioner to pursue an administrative alternative not previously available.”

Editorial summary of the remainder of the concurrence, outside quotation marks: Justice Kennedy agreed that the state court's reliance on the legislature's harm findings was insufficient, but declined to confine the State's regulatory authority to the pre-existing common law of nuisance, reasoning that reasonable expectations in coastal land must account for the State's substantial interest in shoreline preservation.

Editorial summary, outside quotation marks: Justice Blackmun charged the Court with “launch[ing] a missile to kill a mouse” (quoted by the Court at 505 U.S. 1028, n. 15). He argued that the record did not establish total deprivation, that the categorical rule reversed long-settled standards of review by placing the burden on the State, and that early American practice does not support the Court's account of the understandings embodied in the Takings Clause.

Editorial summary, outside quotation marks: Justice Stevens would have looked to “the generality of a regulation of property” in deciding whether compensation is owing (quoted by the Court at 505 U.S. 1027, n. 14), observing that the Beachfront Management Act “regulates the use of the coastline of the entire State.” He concluded that the Act, so understood, did not effect a taking of the petitioner's property.

[505 U.S. 1076] “I would dismiss the writ of certiorari in this case as having been granted improvidently. After briefing and argument it is abundantly clear that an unreviewable assumption on which this case comes to us is both questionable as a conclusion of Fifth Amendment law and sufficient to frustrate the Court's ability to render certain the legal premises on which its holding rests.”

[505 U.S. 1076] “The petition for review was granted on the assumption that the State by regulation had deprived the owner of his entire economic interest in the subject property. Such was the state trial court's conclusion, which the State Supreme Court did not review. It is apparent now that in light of our prior cases . . . the trial court's conclusion is highly questionable.”

[505 U.S. 1076] “Because the questionable conclusion of total deprivation cannot be reviewed, the Court is precluded from attempting to clarify the concept of total (and, in the Court's view, categorically compensable) taking on which it rests, a concept which the Court describes . . . as so uncertain under existing law as to have fostered inconsistent pronouncements by the Court itself.”

Editorial note. This edition reproduces the Reporter of Decisions apparatus at 505 U.S. 1003–1005 and extended verbatim passages of the opinion of the Court, of Justice Kennedy's concurrence in the judgment, and of Justice Souter's separate statement, each marked with the official page on which the passage appears.

Editorial limitations, declared under Authority Library § 09.4: (1) the numbered footnotes of every opinion are not reproduced, save where the Court's own text quotes a separate writing; (2) Part I of the opinion of the Court (505 U.S. 1006–1014), reciting the facts, the Act, and the ripeness question, is summarised in Society prose rather than quoted; (3) the dissents of Justice Blackmun (505 U.S. 1036–1061) and Justice Stevens (505 U.S. 1061–1076) are summarised rather than reproduced, with the quoted phrases drawn from the Court's own opinion; and (4) obvious scanning defects in the digitised volume have been corrected against the surrounding text.

Editorial note. Source correction: the record formerly cited a commercial reproduction as its canonical source. It now cites the Library of Congress digitisation of volume 505 of the United States Reports.

Editorial note. Lucas purchased two residential lots on a South Carolina barrier island in 1986, intending to build single-family homes as his neighbors had. Two years later the Beachfront Management Act established a setback line that barred any permanent habitable structure on his parcels. The state trial court found the lots rendered valueless and awarded over $1.2 million; the Supreme Court of South Carolina reversed on the ground that the Act was directed at a serious public harm.

Editorial note. The Court of Common Pleas entered judgment for Lucas; the Supreme Court of South Carolina reversed, 304 S.C. 376, 404 S.E.2d 895 (1991). The Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari, rejected the argument that a post-argument amendment authorising special permits rendered the claim unripe, reversed, and remanded.

Editorial note. When a regulation denies an owner all economically beneficial or productive use of land, compensation is required without case-specific inquiry into the public interest advanced. The State may defeat such a claim only by identifying background principles of its own property and nuisance law that already prohibited the intended use.

Editorial note. Justice Scalia rejected the harm-prevention rationale as a talismanic distinction, observing that noxious-use reasoning is indistinguishable in practice from benefit-conferring regulation and would leave the Takings Clause dependent on legislative characterization. Total deprivation of beneficial use is the functional equivalent of physical appropriation, so it belongs with the categorical rules rather than with ad hoc balancing. The relevant limitation instead comes from the objective understanding of the owner's title: restrictions that inhere in the State's background law of property and nuisance were never part of the estate acquired.

Editorial note. Lucas establishes the second categorical takings rule (with Loretto) and relocates the police-power defense from legislative purpose to antecedent property law. It makes the content of state nuisance and property doctrine determinative of federal takings liability, and it renders the denominator question — what parcel is measured — decisive in practice.

Editorial note. Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, 533 U.S. 606 (2001), held that a regulation in force at acquisition is not automatically a background principle and that a residual value defeats the categorical rule. Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, 535 U.S. 302 (2002), refused to apply Lucas to temporary development moratoria. Lingle v. Chevron U.S.A. Inc., 544 U.S. 528 (2005), catalogued Lucas as one of the discrete categories of per se takings.

Editorial note. Read with U.S. Const. amend. V (Takings Clause), Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U.S. 393 (1922), and Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U.S. 104 (1978).