Court Opinion

ID: 9531569
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:13:01.097703+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:31.074400
License: Public Domain

*53Dissenting Opinion
Achor, J.
We are not concerned in this case with a question of whether or not the appellee Indianapolis Redevelopment Commission exercised commendable restraint with regard to this particular redevelopment project. However the seriousness of the question confronting us is demonstrated by the fact that only the legality and not the wisdom of the sweeping action of such bodies may be considered on judicial review. Benton County Council v. State ex rel. Sparks (1946), 224 Ind. 114, 121, 65 N. E. 2d 116; Lost Creek School Twp., Vigo County v. York (1939), 215 Ind. 636, 648, 21 N. E. 2d 58.
In this case our concern is whether the Redevelopment Act itself meets the requirements of the Due Process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, by providing reasonable guides or standards for the extraordinary exercise of the police power, which the Redevelopment Act [§48-8501, et seq., Burns’ 1950 Repl.] [Acts 1945, ch. 276, and ch. 170 of the Acts of 1957] purports to authorize.
Although it is true that this court will, with great reluctance only, strike down the acts of the legislature on the ground of unconstitutionality,1 it is equally true that the protection of all citizens in their constitutionally guaranteed right to be secure in their possessions and property, except by due course of law, is one of the most solemn obligations of this court.2
Numerous cases have been cited in which the courts have upheld slum clearance laws as providing reason*54able guides or standards for their application. Edwards v. Housing Authority of City of Mundo (1939), 215 Ind. 330, 19 N. E. 2d 741. However the clearance of slums, where people live in unsanitary and unsafe conditions and the mere development of “blighted” or undeveloped areas, as provided in the Act before us, constitute quite a different situation. The Act with which we are here confronted ventures far into unchartered fields, where the standard pertaining to housing projects are not applicable. True, Section 2 of the 1945 Act [§48-8502] recognizes that there are areas wherein “. . . the available buildings are used in a large part as dwelling accommodations . . . ;” which “. . . accommodations . . . are to a large extent unsanitary and unsafe, . . .”
However, the above statement provides no guide or standard for condemning so-called “blighted areas” outside or beyond such slum areas themselves. Neither does the express definition of “blighted areas” as used in Section 2 of the 1945 Act provide any clearly ascertainable guide or standard by which either the Commission or courts of review can determine the propriety of the condemnation of areas not occupied as housing accommodations. In fact, Section 3 of the 1945 Act [§48-8503] makes no reference whatever to housing accommodations. Said section merely defines “blighted area” as follows:
“ ‘Blighted area’ shall mean any area within the corporate limits of a city to which this act is applicable, or in unincorporated territory within one thousand [1,000] feet of such corporated limits, which because of lack of development, cessation of growth, deterioration of improvements or character of occupancy, age, obsolescence, sub-standard buildings or other factors which have impaired values or prevent a normal development of property, or use thereof, has become under current con*55ditions undesirable for or impossible of normal development and occupancy.”
I submit that the statement of conditions stated in the above definition are so vague that they provide no standard, either in fact or in law which could, with any degree of certainty, provide a clear standard for justifying the action of the Commission, either in the first instance or on judicial review. For example, by what standard of time or physical circumstance can mere “lack of development” of an area be considered cause for appropriation and condemnation of private property at public expense ? By what standard can mere “cessation of growth” constitute cause for appropriation by condemnation ? By what standard can it be determined that,-..mere “deterioration of improvements” is cause for condemnation, or that the mere “character of occupancy” is cause to warrant public appropriation? By what standard can it be determined that .“age” of the property warrants condemnation, or that a building, because of “obsolescence” or being “sub-standard” may be condemned and appropriated at public expense, all as provided in Section 3 of the 1945 Act? The answer to these questions is not to be found in the Act.
Furthermore, Section 3 of the 1945 Act expressly grants the Commission almost unrestrained,.freedom in declaring the existence of “blighted areas” by further providing that property within such areas may be condemned and appropriated because of “other factors which have impaired values or prevent a normal development of property, or use thereof,” without any attempt to state what such “other factors” might be.
If, under the Act, the Commission concludes that'a citizen’s property is located in an area which, in its opinion, stands in the way of .progress, by what standardes he able to-resist its appropriation? It occurs'to *56me that the only limitations upon the extraordinary exercise of the police power, as authorized by the Act, are the limits of the imagination and the social philosophy of the planners themselves. For this reason I believe the Act is unconstitutional.
Arterburn, J., concurs.
Nom—Reported in 154 N. E. 2d 515.

. Illinois Steel Company v. Fuller (1939), 216 Ind. 180, 23 N. E. 2d 259.

. Hanley v. State, Dept. of Conversation et al. (1955), 234 Ind. 326, 123 N. E. 2d 452, Rehearing denied 126 N. E. 2d 879.