ABSTRACT
Under the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution, government must provide "just compensation" to a property owner when it takes the owner's property for "public use." Most disputes involving the Takings Clause center on whether compensation is required or the amount that is required, but in a growing number of cases, the government's definition of "public use" has been challenged. In Midkiff, the US Supreme Court took a step toward defining public use and how far the courts could be involved in determining it. The case was prompted by a 1967 Hawaii law that condemned the property of large landowners and forced them to sell the land to people who were leasing it at the time. The condemnation portion of the law was enacted to force the owners to sell and also to reduce their tax burden.
