Eminent Domain used for Native American Tribes?
The state of New York wants to use eminent domain to so that the Seneca Indian Nation to condemn 26 acres in Niagara Falls so that the Seneca Indian Nation can expand it casino facilities. This would be an expansion of the loss of property rights that were the result of the Kelo v New London Supreme Court decision.
The Empire State Development Corp. determined the Senecas’ expansion plans would be good for Niagara Falls, with the potential to create thousands of jobs and attract more visitors.
“It is determined that ESDC should exercise its power of eminent domain in order to implement the acquisition,” the corporation wrote in findings published as newspaper legal notices late last month.
The Senecas were promised about 50 acres of downtown land as part of their 2002 compact with the state, which let them build the casino — and two others in western New York — in exchange for a share of slot machine profits.
To use eminent domain to condemn land in order to make it available to a separate sovereign nation is a extremely bad precedent. Should the Akaka bill pass and this case make it through the courts and be upheld the precedent would mean that the reorganized native Hawaiian government would be able to go to the state of Hawaii and request the same thing. As long as those in the state government thought there was something to gain in the way of an increase in tax revenues there would be nothing prevent the same thing from happening here.