Opinion ID: 2575723
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Oklahoma General Eminent Domain Statute and Constitutional Eminent Domain Provisions

Text: ¶ 9 The County sought to condemn Landowners' private property pursuant to its general eminent domain power granted by 27 O.S.2001 § 5, which provides as follows: Any county, city, town, township, school district, or board of education, or any board or official having charge of cemeteries created and existing under the laws of this state, shall have power to condemn lands in like manner as railroad companies, for highways, rights-of-way, building sites, cemeteries, public parks and other public purposes. Id. (emphasis added). Additionally, we are guided by the applicable general federal constitutional [9] and state constitutional eminent domain provisions, including and perhaps most notably our special provision concerning the taking of private property. Article 2, § 23 provides as follows: No private property shall be taken or damaged for private use, with or without compensation, unless by consent of the owner, except for private ways of necessity, or for drains and ditches across lands of others for agricultural, mining, or sanitary purposes, in such manner as may be prescribed by law. OKLA. CONST. art. 2, § 23. Our Constitution further generally provides private property shall not be taken or damaged for public use without just compensation. OKLA. CONST. art. 2, § 24. That constitutional provision additionally states [in] all cases of condemnation of private property for public or private use, the determination of the character of the use shall be a judicial question. Id. The law is clear that [p]rivate property may not be taken or damaged by the condemning agency unless the taking or damage is necessary for the accomplishment of a lawful public purpose. Luccock v. City of Norman, 1978 OK 66, 578 P.2d 1204, 1206 (citing Art. 2, §§ 23 & 24 of the Oklahoma Constitution). [10] Luccock demonstrates that we have used the terms public use and public purpose interchangeably in our analysis of our state constitutional eminent domain provisions, and we therefore view these terms as synonymous. See id.; see also Berman v. Parker, 348 U.S. 26, 32, 75 S.Ct. 98, 99 L.Ed. 27 (1954)(noting the narrow role of the judiciary in determining whether the power of eminent domain is being exercised for a public purpose in a case construing a federal statute containing the term public use); Kelo v. City of New London, 545 U.S. 469, ___, 125 S.Ct. 2655, 2662, 162 L.Ed.2d 439 (2005) (explaining that in its application of the Fifth Amendment to the States at the close of the 19th Century, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the use by the public test and embraced a broader and more natural interpretation of public use as public purpose).