Real Estate & Property Law

Cert Petition: Overrule Williamson County

By Robert Thomas (inversecondemnation.com)

What more could we possible say about the bizarre ripeness/issue preclusion Catch-22 brought on by Williamson County Regional Planning Comm'n v. Hamilton Bank of Johnson City, 473 U.S. 172 (1985) that we haven't said before, several times? The rule is unique to regulatory takings law and forces property owners alleging violation of their federal constitutional rights to litigate those claims exclusively in federal court.

If a property owner goes to federal court in the first instance to vindicate its Fifth Amendment rights, it is told it is "too early" and must go to state court first on state law takings claims. When the property owner does so and then comes back to federal court to litigate the now-ripened federal takings claims, it is told it is it already litigated the federal claim (even if it expressly didn't) and it is "too late." In San Remo Hotel, L.P. v. City & County of San Francisco, 545 U.S. 323 (2005) four Justices agreed Williamson County produces absurd results and denies federal court review of federal constitutional rights. Chief Justice Rehnquist wrote:

Finally, Williamson County's state-litigation rule has created some real anomalies, justifying our revisiting the issue... I joined the opinion of the Court in Williamson County. But further reflection and experience lead me to think that the justifications for its state-litigation requirement are suspect, while its impact on takings plaintiffs is dramatic... In an appropriate case, I believe the Court should reconsider whether plaintiffs asserting a Fifth Amendment takings claim based on the final decision of a state or local government entity must first seek compensation in state courts.

The Court has already been asked once this term to overrule Williamson County, and a recently-filed cert petition asks again:

Question 1. Should the Court overrule Williamson County Regional Planning Commission v. Hamilton Bank insofar as it denies property owners the right to litigate their federal causes of action in federal court, the same as all other constitutionally aggrieved citizens, and forces them to seek compensation in state court ostensibly to ripen their federal constitutional takings claims, where four Justices of this Court declared in San Remo Hotel v. City and County of San Francisco that the Williamson County rule is "mistaken" due to its lack of doctrinal underpinning and incoherent effect on federal jurisdiction?

Question 2. Where settled 11th Circuit law has for decades provided that a property owner following the Williamson County rule of state court ripening litigation may "reserve" federal issues for federal court trial, and in fact the 11th Circuit expressly so ordered in an earlier appeal of this case, can the property owner be punished for obeying such an order by having its eventual federal court suit dismissed on the basis of issue preclusion?

Agripost, LLC v. Miami-Dade County, Florida, No. 08-567 (cert. petition filed Oct. 27, 2008). Download the petition here.

The opinion of the Eleventh Circuit in the case below is posted here. The Supreme Court's docket on this case is available here.

Full post as published by inversecondemnation on October 31, 2008 (boomark / email).