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Pacific Views: Property Rights, the Regulatory State, and American Conservatism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 September 2016

Jefferson Decker
Jefferson Decker*
Affiliation:
Rutgers University–New Brunswick
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Journal of Policy History , Volume 28 , Issue 4 , October 2016 , pp. 654 - 679
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Copyright © Donald Critchlow and Cambridge University Press 2016 

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References

NOTES

1. “What Happened to the American Dream?” The Reporter (March/April 1980), Ronald Reagan Subject Collection, Hoover Institution Archives, Stanford University (hereafter “Reagan Subject Collection”), box 10. See also Philip Hager, “Big Sur Dream Clashes with Bureaucracy,” Los Angeles Times, 2 April 1980, B3.

2. See, for example, Layzer, Judith A., “Environmental Policy from 1980–2008: The Politics of Prevention,” in Conservatism and American Political Development, ed. Glenn, Brian J. and Teles, Steven M. (New York, 2009), 223–60Google Scholar; Lazarus, Richard J., The Making of Environmental Law (Chicago, 2004), 67–97Google Scholar; Teles, Steven M., The Rise of the Conservative Legal Movement: The Battle for Control of the Law (Princeton, 2008), 58–89Google Scholar.

3. Baldwin, Malcolm F., “The Santa Barbara Oil Spill,” University of Colorado Law Review 42 (1970–71): 33–76Google Scholar; Hays, Samuel P., Beauty, Health, Permanence: Environmental Politics in the United States, 1955–1985 (Cambridge, 1987), 52–53Google Scholar. On the shape of California’s development, see McGirr, Lisa, Suburban Warriors: The Origins of the New American Right (Princeton, 2001), 20–53Google Scholar; Schrag, Peter, Paradise Lost: California’s Experience, America’s Future (New York, 1998)Google Scholar.

4. The California Coastal Commission was typical of many regulatory initiatives of the Great Society era, which tended to work through mandates and litigation instead of direct appropriations. See Melnick, Shep R., “From Tax and Spend to Mandate and Sue: Liberalism after the Great Society,” in The Great Society and the High Tide of American Liberalism, ed. Milkis, Sidney M. and Milleur, Jerome M. (Amherst, 2005), 387–410.Google Scholar

5. South Central Coast Regional Commission, “Recreation Policies Adopted October 10, 1974,” California Coastal Commission, Office of the Executive Director, California State Archives (hereafter Coastal Commission Files), box 12, folder 4.

6. U.S. Constitution, Amendment V, Sec. 1.

7. For a general discussion of the “police power” and the regulatory state, see Sunstein, Cass R., “Lochner’s Legacy,” Columbia Law Review 87 (1987): 873–919;CrossRefGoogle Scholar Sax, Joseph, “Takings and the Police Power,” Yale Law Journal 74 (1964): 36–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8. Pennsylvania Coal Company v. Mahon, 260 U.S. 393 (1922); Euclid v. Ambler, 272 U.S. 365 (1926).

9. Sax, Joseph P., “Takings, Private Property, and Public Rights,” Yale Law Journal 81 (December 1971): 149–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10. Cited in Siegan, Bernard H., “The Anomaly of Regulation under the Taking Clause,” in Planning without Prices: The Taking Clause as It Relates to Land Use Regulation without Compensation, ed. Siegan, Bernard H. (Lexington, Mass., 1977), 2.Google Scholar See also Reilly, William K., ed., The Use of Land: A Citizen’s Guide to Urban Growth (New York, 1973), 145–75.Google Scholar

11. Siegan, “Anomaly of Regulation,” 4; Siegan, Other People’s Property (Lexington, Mass., 1976); Siegan, Land Use without Zoning (Lexington, Mass., 1972).

12. E. Jack Schoop to State Commissioners, 13 January 1975, Coastal Commission Files, box 12, folder 1.

13. Evelle J. Younger and Raymond Williamson to Thomas A. Crandall, undated but probably 1974, Coastal Commission Files, box 12, folder 6. On property rights and the development of a “land ethic,” see Rome, Adam, The Bulldozer in the Countryside: Suburban Sprawl and the Rise of American Environmentalism (Cambridge, 2001), 230–53.Google Scholar

14. Ronald Zumbrun to PLF Board of Directors, 1 February 1973, Reagan Subject Collection, box 10; Pacific Legal Foundation, “Background on the Formation of Pacific Legal Foundation,” circa 1981, Reagan Subject Collection, box 10.

15. New Attorneys and Administrator Join Team,” Pacific Legal Foundation, Fall Report, 10 October 1974, Reagan Subject Collection, box 10; Pacific Legal Foundation, Second Annual Report, Reagan Subject Collection, box 10.

16. “Protecting Property Rights Is Major Concern of Foundation,” The Reporter (January 1977), Reagan Subject Collection, box 10.

17. Robert M., Collins, “Growth Liberalism in the Sixties: Great Societies at Home and Grand Designs Abroad,” in The Sixties: From Memory to History, ed. Farber, David (Chapel Hill, 1994), 11–44.Google Scholar

18. Horowitz, Daniel, The Anxieties of Affluence: Critiques of American Consumer Culture, 1939–1979 (Amherst, 2004)Google Scholar; Biven, W. Carl, Jimmy Carter’s Economy: Policy in an Age of Limits (Chapel Hill, 2002), esp. 257–59.Google Scholar

19. On public investment during the New Deal, see Smith, Jason Scott, Building New Deal Liberalism: The Political Economy of Public Works, 1933–1956 (Cambridge, 2006)Google Scholar. The two most famous legal cases involving New Deal regulations were Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States, 295 U.S. 495 (1935), and Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 (1942). But several other, lesser-known cases also helped establish and constrain the New Deal state. See Irons, Peter H., The New Deal Lawyers (Princeton, 1982).Google Scholar

20. On the major distinctions between the “new social regulation” and its New Deal predecessors, see Harris, Richard A. and Milkis, Sidney M., The Politics of Regulation Change: A Tale of Two Agencies, 2nd ed. (New York, 1996), 53–139.Google Scholar

21. “Property—Is Private Ownership Outdated?” The Reporter (July/August 1980), Reagan Subject Collection, box 10.

22. “Runaway Government. . . . What Is PLF Doing About It?” The Reporter (October/November 1979), Reagan Subject Collection, box 10.

23. “Is Private Ownership Outdated?”

24. Michael Fischer to Will Hyde, 11 December 1980, Coastal Commission Files, box 20, folder 2; Superior Court of California, County of San Diego, Memorandum Opinion No. 443995, City of Chula Vista v. California Coastal Commission, 8 December 1980, Coastal Commission Files, box 20, folder 2; Ray Gorman, “Response to Chula Vista Decision,” 30 December 1980, Coastal Commission Files, box 20, folder 2; Anthony Summers to Michael Fischer, 6 July 1982, Coastal Commission Files, box 20, folder 2.

25. Ronald Zumbrun et al., Petition for Writ of Administrative Mandamus, Superior Court of the State of California, County of Mendocino, 10 June 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 10; James L. Meyer to Michael Fischer, 26 August 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 10.

26. Petition for Writ of Mandate, Richard Rayburn, Eugenia Laychak, and California Coastal Commission v. State Personnel Board, Superior Court of California, County of San Francisco, 13 December 1984, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 15; brief, Ronald Zumbrun and Anthony Caso, in the matter of Marv Paoli v. Michael Fischer, Richard Rayburn, and Eugenia Laychak, before the State Personnel Board of California, No. 16316, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 12; memorandum, “From Michael Fischer,” 27 July 1984, Coastal Commission Files, box 14, folder 15.

27. Darlene Ruiz to Michael Fischer, 14 March 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 10. See also Darlene Ruiz to Michael Fischer, 4 May 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 10; Darlene Ruiz to Michael Fischer, 7 July 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 10; Fred A. Slimp to Michael Fischer, 7 May 1985, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 17.

28. Pacific Legal Foundation, “The California Coastal Commission in the ’80s: Disquieting Continuities and Suggestions for Reform” (August 1985), 109, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 18.

29. Barry Phegan to Mike Fischer, 2 May 1978, Coastal Commission Files, box 12, folder 18; Barry Phegan, “Notes on Burnout and Morale among Central Office Staff,” 8 March 1979, Coastal Commission Files, box 13, folder 3; Barry Phegan to Michael Fischer, 2 August 1979, Coastal Commission Files, box 13, folder 9; Barna Szabo to Michael Fischer, 30 October 1979, Coastal Commission Files, box 13, folder 11.

30. Michael Fischer to Charles C. Harper, 19 January 1979, Coastal Commission Files, box 13, folder 3; Michael L Fischer, “Budget Statement: California Coastal Commission,” 21 July 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 14, folder 8.

31. Judy B. Rosener, “Deregulation by ‘Proactive Inaction,’” Annual Conference of the American Society for Public Administration (Indianapolis, 1985), 3, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 17.

32. Chula Vista v. California Coastal Commission, Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, Division One, State of California, 2 July 1982, 4 Civ. No. 26584, Coastal Commission Files, box 20, folder 2.

33. Memo, “From Michael Fischer.”

34. Peter Douglas to Darlene Ruiz, 7 July 1983, Coastal Commission Files, box 21, folder 10.

35. Jamee Jordan Patterson to Ralph Faust, 2 May 1986, Coastal Commission Files, box 22, folder 1.

36. Supplemental Petition for Writ of Administrative Mandamus, Nollan v. California Coastal Commission, In the Superior Court of the State of California in and for the County of Ventura, Civ. No. SP 50805, 15 July 1983, U.S. Supreme Court Records for Nollan v. California Coastal Commission, No. 86–133 (hereafter Nollan Files). The case Nollan cited to the commission was Pacific Legal Foundation v. California Coastal Commission, 33 Cal. 3d 158.

37. See Rose, Carol, “The Comedy of the Commons: Custom, Commerce, and Inherently Public Property,” University of Chicago Law Review 53 (Summer 1986): 713–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38. A. Johnston to Milton Williford, 20 January 1976, Coastal Commission Files, box 12, folder 12.

39. Michael Fischer to Mr. and Mrs. Larry Hagman, 14 July 1978, Coastal Commission Files, box 12, folder 19.

40. Pacific Legal Foundation v. California Coastal Commission, 33 Cal. 3d 158, 164; “Coastal Commission Uses Permit Authority to Take Private Property,” The Reporter (January/February 1979), Reagan Subject Collection, box 10.

41. Claire Spiegel, “Panel Gets U.S. Grant for Access to Malibu Beaches,” Los Angeles Times, 11 July 1980; Ken Hively, “Another Round in the Battle,” Los Angeles Times, 21 January 1981.

42. Pacific Legal Foundation v. California Coastal Commission, 33 Cal. 3d 158 (Cal. 1982).

43. Nollan v. California Coastal Commission 483 U.S. 825 (1987).

44. Ibid.

45. James and Marilyn Nollan, Faria Beach Trust Application No. 4–82–90, Hearing before the California Coastal Commission, Santa Barbara, 26 May 1983, U.S. Supreme Court Files for Nollan v. California Coastal Commission, No. 86–133, Microfiche (hereafter “Nollan Files”). On the rules of mootness and ripeness, see Banks, Christopher P. and O’Brien, David M., Courts and Judicial Policymaking (Upper Saddle River, N.J., 2008), 204–5.Google Scholar

46. Tushnet, Mark V., A Court Divided: The Rehnquist Court and the Future of Constitutional Law (New York, 2005), 279–318Google Scholar; Lazarus, Richard J., “The Measure of a Justice: Justice Scalia and the Faltering of the Property Rights Movement within the Supreme Court,” Hastings Law Journal 57 (2005–6): 759–825.Google Scholar

47. Nollan v. California Coastal Commission 483 U.S. 825 (1987).

48. Ibid.; Kenneth B. Noble, “Beach Property Owners Win High Court Ruling,” New York Times, 27 June 1987, 33. On Nollan in the casebooks, see Gunther, Gerald and Sullivan, Kathleen M., Constitutional Law, 13th ed. (Westbury, N.Y., 1997)Google Scholar; Dukeminier, Jesse and Krier, James E., Property, 4th ed. (New York, 1998)Google Scholar.

49. Mervin Field, “Public Feels That California Coastal Act a Good Law, Attaches High Degree of Importance to Its Provisions to Preserve This State’s Coast,” 19 December 1985, http://ucdata.berkeley.edu/data_record.php?recid=50.

50. Elaine Woo, “Peter M. Douglas Dies at 69; California Coastal Commission Chief,” Los Angeles Times, 4 April 2012; Carl Ingram, “In a ‘Green Day,’ Wilson OKs Environmental Bills,” Los Angeles Times, 11 October 1991.

51. Southworth, Ann, Lawyers of the Right: Professionalizing the Conservative Coalition (Chicago, 2008), 24–25.Google Scholar

52. Quoted in Kendall, Douglas T. and Lord, Charles P., “The Takings Project: A Critical Analysis and Assessment of the Progress So Far,” Boston College Environmental Affairs Law Review 25 (1998): 529–30.Google Scholar

53. Charles Fried to Edwin Meese III, 29 October 1986, Files of the Assistant Attorney General F. Henry Habicht II, Department of Justice Files, Record Group 60, National Archives and Records Administration (hereafter “Habicht Files”), box 26.

54. C.F. to Calabresi, Habicht, Kmiec, and Reynolds, 14 October 1986, Habicht Files, box 26; Douglas W. Kmiec to Charles Fried, n.d., Habicht Files, box 26.

55. Layzer, “Environmental Policy from 1980,” 229.

56. Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council, 505 U.S. 1003 (1992); Dolan v. City of Tigard, 512 U.S. 374 (1994).

57. Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, 535 U.S. 302 (2002); Kelo v. City of New London, 545 U.S. 469 (2005). See also Echeverria, John D., “The Death of Regulatory Takings,” Ecology Law Quarterly 34 (2007): 291–97.Google Scholar

58. Clint Bolick to Ronald A. Zumbrun, 13 July 1987, Office Files of Clint Bolick, Department of Justice, Record Group 60, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Md. (hereafter Bolick Files), box 4, folder 148.

59. Clint Bolick, “Notes on Slaughterhouse,” Bolick Files, box 4, folder 143.

60. Teles, Conservative Legal Movement, 241–43.

61. Epstein, Richard A., Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain (Cambridge, Mass., 1985), 281.Google Scholar

62. The following is a small sample of candidates for crucial “swing voters” of the GOP majority. On “white ethnics,” see Rieder, Jonathan, “The Rise of the ‘Silent Majority,’” in The Rise and Fall of the New Deal Order, ed. Fraser, Steve and Gerstle, Gary (Princeton, 1989)Google Scholar; on “sunbelt suburbanites,” see Lassiter, Matthew D., The Silent Majority: Suburban Politics in the Sunbelt South (Princeton, 2006)Google Scholar; on “independent working men,” see Hamilton, Shane, Trucking Country: The Road to America’s Wal-Mart Economy (Princeton, 2008)Google Scholar; on “Wal-mart moms,” see Moreton, Bethany, To Serve God and Wal-Mart: The Making of Christian Free Enterprise (Cambridge, Mass., 2009)Google Scholar.

63. Joshua Marshall, “The Shame of It All,” Talking Points Memo, 28 March 2012, http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-shame-of-it-all.

64. In a few cases, there is a direct intellectual connection between the property rights battles of the 1970s and 1980s and twenty-first-century challenges to the Affordable Care Act. For example, legal scholar Jonathan H. Adler wrote about environmental regulation and the “Takings Issue” before spearheading a challenge to the Obamacare insurance mandate a few years later. See Adler, Jonathan H., “Back to the Future of Conservation: Changing Perceptions of Property Rights and Environmental Protection,” NYU Journal of Law & Liberty 1 (2005): 987–1022.Google Scholar

65. On “postmaterialism,” see Hacker, Jacob S. and Pierson, Paul, Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class (New York, 2010), 145–46.Google Scholar

66. Matt Yglesias, “California Coastal Commission, Gentrification, and Climate Change,” Think Progress, 28 January 2011, http://thinkprogress.org/yglesias/2011/01/28/199769/california-coastal-commission-gentrification-and-climate-change/.