Columbus, OH – On Monday, The Buckeye Institute filed its second amicus brief in Craig v. Cromes, calling on the Ohio Supreme Court to foreclose Cuyahoga County’s home equity theft scheme.

“When Moses Cleaveland laid out the plat map more than 200 years ago for the property where the plaintiffs in this case would live, he would have understood that the government cannot pocket the profits from the sale of property seized to settle a tax debt,” Jay R. Carson, senior litigator at The Buckeye Institute. 

In its brief, The Buckeye Institute argues that the Magna Carta, the U.S. Constitution, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, and the Ohio Constitution all require the sovereign or government to provide just compensation to property owners when it takes their property for the public good. The takings clause is unconditional, and when the government does take private property for public use, its duty to compensate the former owner is “categorical” or absolute. 

In fact, the Ohio Constitution clearly states, “[W]here private property shall be taken for public use, a compensation therefor shall first be made in money . . . and such compensation shall be assessed by a jury, without deduction for benefits to any property of the owner.” Those words, which restrict and qualify the traditional government power of eminent domain, carry the same meaning today that they did when the Framers of the Ohio Constitution wrote them nearly 200 years ago. In Tyler v. Hennepin County, the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed this right.

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