[Cboldt]

The state is sovereign. All property within its confines belongs and is controlled by the state. Your right to own property is granted to you by the state. Its right to remove your property is absolute.

Amendment V of the US Constitution "...nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation."

Not quite absolute, in the general sense. Certainly, no individual has a snowball's chance in hell of beating the government at its own game.

[VRWC_minion]

nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation."

I agree that the owners should be compensated for the taking of their property mrasured by the decrease in profits due to the smoking ban.

Unfortunately two groups disagree with me. The smokers disagree because they really don't gove two craps about the owner, they just want to be able to smoke and compensating the owner doesn't get them the result they want.

The second "group" is the courts who have ruled that this only applies to a full taking of the property. An imposistion of a regulation or law doesn't constitute a complete taking. I happen to disagree but then I'm not the judge.