[VRWCmember]

What if you drive a $30,000 car and I decide that I'd like to buy it from you. I appraise the car at $2500 but to show what a nice guy I am I'll pay you $8000 for it. If you aren't willing to take the $8000, should the government be able to force you to sell it to me for that price? After all, it's over three times the appraised value of the car.

[Alberta's Child]

That would be a legitimate gripe, but I have yet to see any compelling evidence that the money these folks were paid for their homes was less than what they would have gotten if they had sold them on their own.

Mind you -- I'm not on the government's side in this case . . . I simply wanted to point out that the property owners' legitimate complaint is one based on principle, not (necessarily) economics.

If I have a $250,000 home and I'm paid $500,000 by a government in a completely unjust eminent domain proceeding, I may be on solid grounds from a legal/moral standpoint -- but I'd have a hard time convincing too many people that my property was "confiscated" from me.