This is Part 10 in a series celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Harvard University Press' 1985 publication of Richard A. Epstein's "Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain."
We continue our celebration of this anniversary with a fair use and transformative reading, taking a close look at ch. 5 continuing in the same section which Richard calls ""Takings Prima Facia," which makes the analogy between private law takings in the common law harm tradition and the public law takings where the government is a defendant. He titles chapter 5, "Partial Takings: The Unity of Ownership," because he's taking a look at the natural law of the natural coherent unity of the very nature of incidents of ownership (possession, use, disposition/abuse) and the American constitutional order, how these things interact and hang together, ensconced as it is in the purpose of the Constitution. That moral purpose is the protection of individual liberty against claims by a simple majority in a democracy, or judicial or executive fiat, or by the government in any other way in a taking of private property. It's also a good reflection on nature of property per se, whether public or private. For governments are owners as well as takers of property.
Today we discuss the entirety of his chapter 5 from pp. 57 to 62..
At the end, this episode concludes with a reading of Psalm 52 in the ESV and January 27th in Streams in the Desert (Cowman Publications, Lost Feliz Station Lost Angeles, Calif. 1925 original non-woke edition).
Excellent stuff here. Excellent.
Every college student should read this book. It's a superb introduction to the political philosophy of the American regime. Praise the Lord.
We'd like to thank Harvard University Press for making this material available and Richard Epstein for writing it.
Make sure you buy the book and follow along.
It's very important for you to have your own copy on your own bookshelf, and to begin to master this material. Support your local book dealer. See if they have a copy of it, or if they'd mind keeping an eye out for you.
I always encourage buying physical books, objects you can have, hold, cherish, learn from, display on your bookshelf as a topic of conversation, things you can pass on to the next generation with your notes in them, things that do not depend upon electricity.
Toward that end:
Go to Harvard University Press for more selections available for purchase. Please support the publisher and your local booksellers.
The Republican Professor is a pro-correctly-contemplating-property-rights podcast.
The Republican Professor is produced and hosted by Dr. Lucas J. Mather, Ph.D.
Warmly,
Lucas J. Mather, Ph.D.
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