Opinion ID: 888159
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The State's and the Ranchers' Means-Ends Arguments

Text: ¶ 119 The State asserts that a means-ends analysis of I-143  i.e., inquiring whether the Initiative substantially advances some legitimate public purpose  is improper in the takings context. The State is correct, at least with respect to the Fifth Amendment. The Supreme Court has explained that the critical question in a regulatory takings analysis is whether the regulation is so onerous that its effect is functionally equivalent to the classic taking in which government directly appropriates private property or ousts the owner from his domain. Lingle v. Chevron U.S.A. Inc., 544 U.S. 528, 537, 539, 125 S.Ct. 2074, 2081, 2082, 161 L.Ed.2d 876 (2005). A substantially advances test is ineffective for answering this question. It reveals nothing about the magnitude or character of the burden that the regulation imposes upon private property rights. Rather, it probes the regulation's underlying validity. Lingle, 544 U.S. at 542, 543, 125 S.Ct. at 2084. Yet, such an inquiry is logically prior to and distinct from the question whether a regulation effects a taking, for the Takings Clause presupposes that the government has acted in pursuit of a valid public purpose. The Clause expressly requires compensation where government takes private property for public use. It does not bar government from interfering with property rights, but rather requires compensation in the event of otherwise proper interference amounting to a taking. Conversely, if a government action is found to be impermissible  for instance because it fails to meet the public use requirement or is so arbitrary as to violate due process  that is the end of the inquiry. No amount of compensation can authorize such action. Lingle, 544 U.S. at 543, 125 S.Ct. at 2084 (citation and some internal quotation marks omitted). ¶ 120 The Ranchers acknowledge the Supreme Court's clarifications of federal takings doctrine in Lingle; however, they point out that  Lingle did not, and in fact could not, foreclose an independent interpretation of the Montana Constitution. The Ranchers suggest that under Article II, Section 29, [i]n order to avoid the constitutional mandate of just compensation, the State must show a compelling state interest that is narrowly tailored to impose the least restraints possible on [the Ranchers'] interests. In an alternative formulation, the Ranchers assert that the State must demonstrate that it has employed the least restrictive means in accomplishing the purposes of I-143. While I agree with the Ranchers that this Court may  indeed, must  provide an independent interpretation of Article II, Section 29, I agree with the State that the Ranchers' proposed test is inapt for analyzing claims brought under Article II, Section 29. ¶ 121 Article II, Section 29 states, in pertinent part, that [p]rivate property shall not be taken or damaged for public use without just compensation to the full extent of the loss. This language requires compensation where the State takes or damages private property for public use, but it does not require the public use to be compelling, nor does it require the State to employ the least restrictive means for achieving its goals. Rather, when considering whether a regulation has taken or damaged private property, the analysis presupposes that the regulation is permissible and the focus is properly directed to the regulation's effect on the property and whether just compensation is owed. Cf. Lingle, 544 U.S. at 537, 543, 125 S.Ct. at 2081, 2084. ¶ 122 It thus makes little sense to inquire whether the State has employed the least restrictive means of achieving a compelling state interest. Whether or not the State has done so may tell us whether the regulation sweeps more broadly than is necessary or whether the regulation fails to meet the public use requirement. But it tells us nothing about the regulation's effect and the burden the regulation imposes on private property rights. In other words, it does not tell us whether property has been taken or damaged. ¶ 123 Moreover, even if the least restrictive means have been employed and even if the State's interest is compelling, the property owner still may have suffered a taking or damaging of property. In this connection, the following reasoning by the Supreme Court in Lingle is persuasive: The owner of a property subject to a regulation that effectively serves a legitimate state interest may be just as singled out and just as burdened as the owner of a property subject to an ineffective regulation. It would make little sense to say that the second owner has suffered a taking while the first has not. Likewise, an ineffective regulation may not significantly burden property rights at all, and it may distribute any burden broadly and evenly among property owners. The notion that such a regulation nevertheless takes private property for public use merely by virtue of its ineffectiveness or foolishness is untenable. Lingle, 544 U.S. at 543, 125 S.Ct. at 2084. For these reasons, the Supreme Court's rejection of means-ends analysis under the Fifth Amendment is sensible and should apply equally under Article II, Section 29. ¶ 124 That said, the State inexplicably proceeds to argue the converse of the Ranchers' proposed test. The State asserts that property rights are subject to reasonable exercise of the police power and that Article II, Section 29 does not alter in a fundamental way the police power to adopt reasonable regulations that protect public health, safety, and welfare. Based on Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U.S. 623, 8 S.Ct. 273, 31 L.Ed. 205 (1887), the State insists that the government cannot be compelled to pay compensation whenever it reasonably determines that a commercial activity is injurious to public health, safety, or welfare. ¶ 125 The State's position, in short, is that it cannot be required to pay compensation where the challenged regulation is a valid exercise of the police power related to a commercial activity. Of course, the corollary of this rule is that the government can be required to pay compensation where the challenged regulation is an invalid exercise of the police power related to a commercial activity  the very proposition the State goes to great lengths to refute. But there are additional flaws in the State's approach. ¶ 126 First, Mugler stands for the limited proposition that the government need not pay compensation when it exercises its power to prohibit a noxious use of property, i.e., a use akin to a public nuisance. See Kafka Dissent, ¶¶ 126-129. However, alternative livestock ranching, which was done and maintained under the express authority of Title 87, chapter 4, part 4, MCA, was in no way a public nuisance, see § 27-30-101(2), MCA, and the State may not escape paying just compensation for the Ranchers' losses through the mere expedient of declaring that which formerly was not a public nuisance to have been a public nuisance all along, see Kafka Dissent, ¶¶ 132-134. In this regard, the State's smug condemnation of the alternative livestock industry as some sort of noxious or abhorrent threat to the public health, safety, and welfare rings hollow in light of the State's 83-year role in creating, developing, and nurturing the industry in the first place. ¶ 127 Second, the Supreme Court has explicitly rejected the notion that a valid police power regulation never requires compensation to the owner. In Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council, 505 U.S. 1003, 112 S.Ct. 2886, 120 L.Ed.2d 798 (1992), the Court stated that there are limits to the noncompensable exercise of the police power. Lucas, 505 U.S. at 1026, 112 S.Ct. at 2899. Otherwise, if the uses of private property were subject to unbridled, uncompensated qualification under the police power, `the natural tendency of human nature [would be] to extend the qualification more and more until at last private property disappear[ed].' Lucas, 505 U.S. at 1014, 112 S.Ct. at 2892-93 (brackets in Lucas) (quoting Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U.S. 393, 415, 43 S.Ct. 158, 160, 67 L.Ed. 322 (1922)). ¶ 128 In conclusion, whether I-143 employs the least restrictive means of achieving a compelling state interest is irrelevant to the analysis under Article II, Section 29. Rather, in considering whether the Initiative took or damaged the Ranchers' property, the analysis presupposes that the regulation is permissible and the focus is on the regulation's effect on the Ranchers' property. Likewise, and for the same reasons, the State cannot escape paying just compensation on the ground that I-143 represents a reasonabl[e] determin[ation] that [alternative livestock ranching] is injurious to public health, safety, or welfare.