Pennsylvania woman wins Supreme Court property rights case

[Eugene]

Source: Associated Press

16 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is siding with a Pennsylvania woman in a case that gives citizens another way to pursue claims when they believe states and local governments have harmed their property rights.

The high court ruled Friday in the case of Rose Mary Knick. She tried to bring a lawsuit in federal court after her town passed a law that requires anyone with a cemetery on their land to open it to the public during the day. Knick argued that in passing the law the state was in essence taking her property without paying her for it.

A federal court threw out Knick’s case, ruling she had to go to state court first.

After the Supreme Court’s ruling, Knick will be able to take her case to federal court.

Read more: https://apnews.com/e4726b6d6d5d4de286a43d2301ac63b9

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Short article. No more at link yet.

Supreme Court opinion: 17-647 Knick v. Township of Scott

[Honeycombe8]

1. Interesting.

I suppose one answer would be that the city pay to have the graveyard moved. And the owner would have no say in that. Either allow the public or allow the city to move it. One person can't hold the remains of other human beings hostage.

[lagomorph777]

11. That might be a family cemetary. Many rural families have that.

Would you want to open that up to the public if you had one?

[Honeycombe8]

13. No....that's why the city is demanding that it be opened to the public.

They're not the owner's relatives. It's a cemetery.

She'll lose this in court. She can't hold people's remains hostage.

[jberryhill]

2. Per usual, dumb headline by AP

She didn't win her case.

She won the right to pursue her case in court.

Whether she ultimately wins that case is not anywhere near decided.

This was a procedural ruling, not a ruling having anything to do with the substance of the claim.

[Turin_C3PO]

5. I wonder why the AP does that with headlines?

Very misleading.

[TeamPooka]

8. click bait. They need the traffic.

[jberryhill]

9. Two factors

(1) Buying into the hype of the right wing group promoting the story, and (2) not really having the wherewithal to understand what the decision was about.

[RobinA]

6. Thank You

That was my first thought. She didn't win her property rights case, she won her procedural case. The misstating of court rulings is constant and drives me crazy. Reading comprehension is obviously not required for headline writers.

[Lonestarblue]

3. More facts on this case.

From the website of the Pacific Legal Foundation:

“In 2013, government agents forced Rose Knick to allow public access to a suspected gravesite on her farmland. Rose sued over the unconstitutional property taking. But a federal court refused to hear her federal claim citing the 1985 Supreme Court decision Williamson County. Rose has asked the Court to overturn this precedent so property rights are on equal footing with other rights such as due process and free speech. On behalf of Rose and all property owners, PLF argued Knick before the Supreme Court on October 3, 2018, followed by reargument on January 16, 2019.”

“Hundreds of years of property records find no gravesites on Rose Knick’s 90-acre farm in Scott Township, Pennsylvania—a rural area on the eastern side of the state. Rose lives alone on the property, which has been in her family since 1970.”

Here’s the background information I found. The case stems from one person who decided that one of his ancestors (from the Colonial era) was buried on Knick’s farm and he should have the right to visit that grave whenever he wanted. Once open to the public, any number of strangers would also have been allowed access to her farm. As a woman living alone, that would be frightening, never mind having perfect strangers traipsing through your property at all hours of the day.

From https://landownerattorneys.com/supreme-court-agrees-to-hear-pennsylvania-takings-case-regarding-revolutionary-war-era-cemetery/

“Rose Mary Knick purchased her sprawling farm in 1970 to raise horses. The seeds of dispute germinated in 2008 when Robert Vail discovered an obituary for one of his ancestors, reportedly buried on Knick’s property (once known as the McLaughlin Farm). Vail soon learned that other relatives—including a Colonial-era veteran—might be buried there too. Vail asked Knick for permission to visit her property and said he saw tombstones there. (Knick calls them rocks.) Vail steadfastly maintains that he doesn’t want the cemetery—he simply wants to visit the graves to pay his respects. Knick refused access.”

[jberryhill]

4. Interesting take...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Legal_Foundation

"Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) is a conservative/libertarian public interest law firm in the United States."

I like the slant, though - "one person who decided that one of his ancestors (from the Colonial era) was buried on Knick’s farm"

He "decided" his ancestor was buried there? Sort of the way that Native Americans do the same thing? But if it is Native Americans, we are sympathetic to claims for access to their burial grounds, because it matters when it is a group we romanticize.

None of those facts, whether sympathetically stated by right wingers or not, have to do with what this decision was about, though.

Do you often consult the opinions of an organization which includes the "Torture Memo" author John Yoo on its board of directors?

[Igel]

7. Here's another link. Different in nature.

https://www.inquirer.com/philly/news/scotus-cemetery-pa-farm-private-property-scott-township-lackawanna-rose-mary-knick-20180524.html

It gives local background to the story.

Note that in the first photo, the "stones" (they are rock) do look like tombstones. However, there's an awful lot of them in a row, but still, "tombstone" doesn't seem entirely unreasonable a suspicion.

In a later photo, there's another photo that might provide an answer: The local rocks look like flagstones. They're in clear strata, which can be separated, and were used in building a wall that was still high enough to be stood on and identified as a wall. Flip back to the first picture, and you realize that the "tombstones" might just be larger flagstones that a low wall rested on. It was a farm--the trees aren't untouched forest, but reclaimed forest--and it was usual to clear fields for plowing by building walls.

I suspect a compromise might have been possible. I don't like the skullduggery that's alleged between Vail and the local legislators. But it seems not unreasonable to allow a private citizen to claim that an ancestor was buried there, allow investigation, and then allow descendants and documented relatives of anybody interred there to visit. However, at 250 years' remove, the genetic signal's going to be attenuated, I'd think. I'd also think that skeletal remains, given the moisture and soil acidity, after 250 years are going to be pretty much dissolved.

[Jake Stern]

10. I hope she wins

I wouldn't want everybody and their cousin trampling on my land because somebody's great great great great great great great gramps is buried there.

[MicaelS]

12. No kidding.

That is exactly my belief.

[Polybius]

14. Perhaps property taxes will one day be struck down

Right here, they are very high for a modest house.