An Open Letter to the President

Dear Mr. Bush,

Let me open by stating that you were the beneficiary of my vote last November 2nd. I state that proudly. Your stance in the Mideast, and the freedom now blooming there, makes me proud to be an American. And your idea of the ownership society creates hope for a better future in the hearts of Americans here at home. That said, there is a hugely important issue that demands your immediate attention. An issue you have been oddly silent on.

How is it that at the same time the light of freedom is being lit in the Arab world, it is in danger of being extinguished right here at home? The Supreme Court is, at this moment, hearing a case that is absolutely crucial to the American way of life as we know it. In Kelo v. City of New London, the Court has the future of private property in this country in their somewhat inept hands.

The case, as you well know, involves a municipality attempting to force property owners to sell their legally entitled land. This land will then be turned over to the Pfizer pharmaceutical company for the sole reason of simply increasing the city’s tax base. The gist of this decision is that it will then be legal for any governmental body to seize land from ‘A’ and give it to ‘B’ merely to add cash to their dwindling coffers.

Imagine Mr. President, if the Mayor of Washington D.C. decided that the land the White House sits on would be better used, would be more economically lucrative, if it was redeveloped as a water park. Sound far fetched? Not if you are an average land owning citizen unfortunate enough to have bought land in an area a developer deems profitable.

Our country was built sir, as you are well aware, on private property rights. The right to own land is one of those rights, however is not the only property right we as Americans possess. Private property rights, presently anyway, include the owning of one’s money, one’s possessions, one’s savings and investments, and even one’s intellectual property. It has been, and is now, the dream of most Americans to own their own home. To own a car, have savings, build an estate. To gain wealth through hard work and initiative. To have a good life, and maybe leave something to the next generation. But if the High Court deems our ownership society(your words) a thing of the past, the consequences will be far reaching and dire.

And what will the consequences be? How will the wrong decision by the Court affect housing sales? How will it affect property values? What will be the incentive to work hard and save in order to buy a home for yourself and your family, if it never is really yours in the first place? When the government can take your land merely because it believes it can use the land more economically, how far are we then from the government taking your paycheck because it decides it can spend that money more effectively? How far from it taking your vehicle because that SUV is not fuel efficient? How far, Mr. President, from Communism?

Is it right sir, that the future of our Capitalist system lies in the hands of a group of persons never elected by the people of this great country? If we are to become a state where land is basically owned by the government and rented to it’s people, should this change not at least come from the Legislature? The body constitutionally ordained to make the laws?

In your bid to be the leader of the free world, you spoke of an ‘ownership society’ and of spreading freedom to the oppressed throughout the world. Exactly what type of freedom do we want the world to strive for? Do we want those oppressed to look to America as an example of what freedom can be? Where, Mr. President, is freedom without a right to ownership? How free are a people whose government abuses that right? Your ownership society is now at risk, Mr. Bush, as is the freedom of your own people right here at home.

(E-mailed to Mr. Bush 2-28-05 @ 6:25 P.M.)
crossposted @ The Wide Awakes