Lead Opinion
Under the United States Department of Agriculture's California Raisin Marketing Order, a percentage of a grower's crop must be physically set aside in certain years for the account of the Government, free of charge. The Government then sells, allocates, or otherwise disposes of the raisins in ways it determines are best suited to maintaining an orderly market. The question is whether the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment bars the Government from imposing such a demand on the growers without just compensation.
I
The Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937 authorizes the Secretary of Agriculture to promulgate "marketing orders" to help maintain stable markets for particular agricultural products. The marketing order for raisins requires growers in certain years to give a percentage of their crop to the Government, free of charge. The required allocation is determined by the Raisin Administrative Committee, a Government entity composed largely of growers and others in the raisin business appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture. In 2002-2003, this Committee ordered raisin growers to turn over 47 percent of their crop. In 2003-2004, 30 percent.
Growers generally ship their raisins to a raisin "handler," who physically separates the raisins due the Government (called "reserve raisins"), pays the growers only for the remainder ("free-tonnage raisins"), and packs and sells the free-tonnage raisins. The Raisin Committee acquires title to the reserve raisins that have been set aside, and decides how to dispose of them in its discretion. It sells them in noncompetitive markets, for example to exporters, federal agencies, or foreign governments; donates them to charitable causes; releases them to growers who agree to reduce their raisin production; or disposes of them by "any other means" consistent with the purposes of the raisin program.
The Hornes-Marvin Horne, Laura Horne, and their family-are both raisin growers and handlers. They "handled" not only their own raisins but also those produced by other growers, paying those growers in full for all of their raisins, not just the free-tonnage portion. In 2002, the Hornes refused to set aside any raisins for the Government, believing they were not legally bound to do so. The Government sent trucks to the Hornes' facility at eight o'clock one morning to pick up the raisins, but the Hornes refused entry. App. 31; cf. post, at 2442 (SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting).
*2425The Government then assessed against the Hornes a fine equal to the market value of the missing raisins-some $480,000-as well as an additional civil penalty of just over $200,000 for disobeying the order to turn them over.
When the Government sought to collect the fine, the Hornes turned to the courts, arguing that the reserve requirement was an unconstitutional taking of their property under the Fifth Amendment. Their case eventually made it to this Court when the Government argued that the lower courts had no jurisdiction to consider the Hornes' constitutional defense to the fine. Horne v. Department of Agriculture,569 U.S. ----,
On remand, the Ninth Circuit agreed with the Hornes that the validity of the fine rose or fell with the constitutionality of the reserve requirement.
The court instead viewed the reserve requirement as a use restriction, similar to a government condition on the grant of a land use permit. See Dolan v. City of Tigard,
We granted certiorari. 574 U.S. ----,
II
The petition for certiorari poses three questions, which we answer in turn.
A
The first question presented asks "Whether the government's 'categorical duty' under the Fifth Amendment to pay just compensation when it 'physically takes possession of an interest in property,' Arkansas Game & Fish Comm'n v. United States,--- U.S. ----,
1
There is no dispute that the "classic taking [is one] in which the government directly appropriates private property for its own use." Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council, Inc. v. Tahoe Regional Planning *2426Agency,
Nothing in the text or history of the Takings Clause, or our precedents, suggests that the rule is any different when it comes to appropriation of personal property. The Government has a categorical duty to pay just compensation when it takes your car, just as when it takes your home.
The Takings Clause provides: "[N]or shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation." U.S. Const., Amdt. 5. It protects "private property" without any distinction between different types. The principle reflected in the Clause goes back at least 800 years to Magna Carta, which specifically protected agricultural crops from uncompensated takings. Clause 28 of that charter forbade any "constable or other bailiff" from taking "corn or other provisions from any one without immediately tendering money therefor, unless he can have postponement thereof by permission of the seller." Cl. 28 (1215), in W. McKechnie, Magna Carta, A Commentary on the Great Charter of King John 329 (2d ed. 1914).
The colonists brought the principles of Magna Carta with them to the New World, including that charter's protection against uncompensated takings of personal property. In 1641, for example, Massachusetts adopted its Body of Liberties, prohibiting "mans Cattel or goods of what kinde soever" from being "pressed or taken for any publique use or service, unlesse it be by warrant grounded upon some act of the generall Court, nor without such reasonable prices and hire as the ordinarie rates of the Countrie do afford." Massachusetts Body of Liberties ¶ 8, in R. Perry, Sources of Our Liberties 149 (1978). Virginia allowed the seizure of surplus "live stock, or beef, pork, or bacon" for the military, but only upon "paying or tendering to the owner the price so estimated by the appraisers." 1777 Va. Acts ch. XII. And South Carolina authorized the seizure of "necessaries" for public use, but provided that "said articles so seized shall be paid for agreeable to the prices such and the like articles sold for on the ninth day of October last." 1779 S.C. Acts § 4.
Given that background, it is not surprising that early Americans bridled at appropriations of their personal property during the Revolutionary War, at the hands of both sides. John Jay, for example, complained to the New York Legislature about military impressment by the Continental Army of "Horses, Teems, and Carriages," and voiced his fear that such action by the "little Officers" of the Quartermasters Department might extend to "Blankets, Shoes, and many other articles." A Hint to the Legislature of the State of New York (1778), in John Jay, The Making of a Revolutionary 461-463 (R. Morris ed. 1975) (emphasis deleted). The legislature took the "hint," passing a law that, among other things, provided for compensation for the impressment of horses and carriages. 1778 N.Y. Laws ch. 29. According to the author of the first treatise on the Constitution, St. George Tucker, the Takings Clause was "probably" adopted in response to "the arbitrary and oppressive mode of obtaining supplies for the army, and other public uses, by impressment, as was too frequently practised during the revolutionary war, without any compensation whatever." 1 Blackstone's Commentaries, Editor's App. 305-306 (1803).
*2427Nothing in this history suggests that personal property was any less protected against physical appropriation than real property. As this Court summed up in James v. Campbell,
"[A patent] confers upon the patentee an exclusive property in the patented invention which cannot be appropriated or used by the government itself, without just compensation, any more than it can appropriate or use without compensation land which has been patented to a private purchaser."
Prior to this Court's decision in Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon,
Four years after Penn Central,however, the Court reaffirmed the rule that a physical appropriationof property gave rise to a per setaking, without regard to other factors. In Loretto,the Court held that requiring an owner of an apartment building to allow installation of a cable box on her rooftop was a physical taking of real property, for which compensation was required. That was true without regard to the claimed public benefit or the economic impact on the owner. The Court explained that such protection was justified not only by history, but also because "[s]uch an appropriation is perhaps the most serious form of invasion of an owner's property interests," depriving the owner of the "the rights to possess, use and dispose of" the property.
The Ninth Circuit based its distinction between real and personal property on this Court's discussion in Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council,
Lucas,however, was about regulatory takings, not direct appropriations. Whatever Lucashad to say about reasonable expectations with regard to regulations, people still do not expect their property, real or personal, to be actually occupied or taken away. Our cases have stressed the "longstanding distinction" between government acquisitions of property and regulations. Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council,
2
The reserve requirement imposed by the Raisin Committee is a clear physical taking. Actual raisins are transferred from the growers to the Government. Title to the raisins passes to the Raisin Committee. App. to Pet. for Cert. 179a; Tr. of Oral Arg. 31. The Committee's raisins must be physically segregated from free-tonnage raisins.
Raisin growers subject to the reserve requirement thus lose the entire "bundle" of property rights in the appropriated raisins-"the rights to possess, use and dispose of" them, Loretto,
The Government thinks it "strange" and the dissent "baffling" that the Hornes object to the reserve requirement, when they nonetheless concede that "the government may prohibit the sale of raisins without effecting a per se taking." Brief for Respondent 35; post, at 2443 (SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting). But that distinction flows naturally from the settled difference in our takings jurisprudence between appropriation and regulation. A physical taking of raisins and a regulatory limit on production may have the same economic impact on a grower. The Constitution, however, is concerned with means as well as ends. The Government has broad powers, but the means it uses to achieve its ends must be "consist[ent] with the letter and spirit of the constitution." McCulloch v. Maryland,
B
The second question presented asks "Whether the government may avoid the categorical duty to pay just compensation for a physical taking of property by reserving to the property owner a contingent interest in a portion of the value of the property, set at the government's discretion." The answer is no.
The Government and dissent argue that raisins are fungible goods whose only value is in the revenue from their sale. According to the Government, the raisin marketing order leaves that interest with the raisin growers: After selling reserve raisins and deducting expenses and subsidies *2429for exporters, the Raisin Committee returns any net proceeds to the growers.
But when there has been a physical appropriation, "we do not ask ... whether it deprives the owner of all economically valuable use" of the item taken. Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council,
The dissent points to Andrus v. Allard,
The Government and dissent again confuse our inquiry concerning per setakings with our analysis for regulatory takings. A regulatory restriction on use that does not entirely deprive an owner of property rights may not be a taking under Penn Central. That is why, in PruneYard Shopping Center v. Robins,
C
The third question presented asks "Whether a governmental mandate to relinquish specific, identifiable property as a 'condition' on permission to engage in commerce effects a per se taking." The answer, at least in this case, is yes.
The Government contends that the reserve requirement is not a taking because raisin growers voluntarily choose to participate in the raisin market. According to the Government, if raisin growers don't like it, they can "plant different crops," or "sell their raisin-variety grapes as table grapes or for use in juice or wine." Brief for Respondent 32 (brackets and internal quotation marks omitted).
"Let them sell wine" is probably not much more comforting to the raisin growers than similar retorts have been to others throughout history. In any event, the Government is wrong as a matter of law. In Loretto,we rejected the argument that the New York law was not a taking because a landlord could avoid the requirement by ceasing to be a landlord. We held instead that "a landlord's ability to rent his property may not be conditioned on his forfeiting the right to compensation for a physical occupation."
"For example, it would allow the government to require a landlord to devote a substantial portion of his building to vending and washing machines, with all profits to be retained by the owners of these services and with no compensation for the deprivation of space. It would even allow the government to requisition a certain number of apartments as permanent government offices."Ibid.
As the Court concluded, property rights "cannot be so easily manipulated."
The Government and dissent rely heavily on Ruckelshaus v. Monsanto Co.,
The taking here cannot reasonably be characterized as part of a similar voluntary exchange. In one of the years at issue here, the Government insisted that the Hornes turn over 47 percent of their raisin crop, in exchange for the "benefit" of being allowed to sell the remaining 53 percent. The next year, the toll was 30 percent. We have already rejected the idea that Monsantomay be extended by regarding basic and familiar uses of property as a "Government benefit" on the same order as a permit to sell hazardous chemicals. See Nollan,
Leonard & Leonard v. Earle,
Raisins are not like oysters: they are private property-the fruit of the growers' labor-not "public things subject to the absolute control of the state," id.,at 258,
III
The Government correctly points out that a taking does not violate the Fifth Amendment unless there is no just compensation, and argues that the Hornes are free to seek compensation for any taking by bringing a damages action under the Tucker Act in the Court of Federal Claims. See
As noted, the Hornes are both growers and handlers. Their situation is unusual in that, as handlers, they have the full economic interest in the raisins the Government alleges should have been set aside for its account. They own the raisins they grew and are handling for themselves, and they own the raisins they handle for other growers, having paid those growers for all their raisins (not just the free-tonnage amount, as is true with respect to most handlers). See supra,at 2424 - 2425; Tr. of Oral Arg. 3-4. The penalty assessed against them as handlers included the dollar equivalent of the raisins they refused to set aside-their raisins.
Finally, the Government briefly argues that if we conclude that the reserve requirement effects a taking, we should remand *2432for the Court of Appeals to calculate "what compensation would have been due if petitioners had complied with the reserve requirement." Brief for Respondent 55. The Government contends that the calculation must consider what the value of the reserve raisins would have been without the price support program, as well as "other benefits ... from the regulatory program, such as higher consumer demand for raisins spurred by enforcement of quality standards and promotional activities." Id.,at 55-56. Indeed, according to the Government, the Hornes would "likely" have a net gain under this theory. Id.,at 56.
The best defense may be a good offense, but the Government cites no support for its hypothetical-based approach, or its notion that general regulatory activity such as enforcement of quality standards can constitute just compensation for a specific physical taking. Instead, our cases have set forth a clear and administrable rule for just compensation: "The Court has repeatedly held that just compensation normally is to be measured by 'the market value of the property at the time of the taking.' " United States v. 50 Acres of Land,
Justice BREYER is concerned that applying this rule in this case will affect provisions concerning whether a condemning authority may deduct special benefits-such as new access to a waterway or highway, or filling in of swampland-from the amount of compensation it seeks to pay a landowner suffering a partial taking. Post,at 2435 - 2436 (opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part); see Bauman v. Ross,
*2433In any event, this litigation presents no occasion to consider the broader issues discussed by Justice BREYER. The Government has already calculated the amount of just compensation in this case, when it fined the Hornes the fair market value of the raisins: $483,843.53.
The judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is reversed.
It is so ordered.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co.,
Concurrence Opinion
I join the Court's opinion in full. I write separately to offer an additional observation concerning Justice BREYER's argument that we should remand the case. The Takings Clause prohibits the government from taking private property except "for public use," even when it offers "just compensation." U.S. Const., Amdt. 5. That requirement, as originally understood, imposes a meaningful constraint on the power of the state-"the government may take property only if it actually uses or gives the public a legal right to use the property." Kelo v. New London,
Justice BREYER, with whom Justice GINSBURGand Justice KAGANjoin, concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I agree with Parts I and II of the Court's opinion. However, I cannot agree with the Court's rejection, in Part III, of the Government's final argument. The Government contends that we should remand the case for a determination of whether any compensation would have been due if the Hornes had complied with the California Raisin Marketing Order's reserve requirement. In my view, a remand for such a determination is necessary.
The question of just compensation was not presented in the Hornes' petition for certiorari. It was barely touched on in the briefs. And the courts below did not decide it. At the same time, the case law that I have found indicates that the Government may well be right: The marketing order may afford just compensation for the takings of raisins that it imposes. If that is correct, then the reserve requirement does not violate the Takings Clause.
I
The Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment provides that "private property [shall *2434not] be taken for public use, without just compensation." The Clause means what it says: It "does not proscribe the taking of property; it proscribes taking without just compensation." Williamson County Regional Planning Comm'n v. Hamilton Bank of Johnson City,
On the record before us, the Hornes have not established that the Government, through the raisin reserve program, takes raisins without just compensation. When the Government takes as reserve raisins a percentage of the annual crop, the raisin owners retain the remaining, free-tonnage, raisins. The reserve requirement is intended, at least in part, to enhance the price that free-tonnage raisins will fetch on the open market. See
More than a century ago, in Bauman v. Ross,
"[W]hen part only of a parcel of land is taken for a highway, the value of that part is not the sole measure of the compensation or damages to be paid to the owner; but the incidental injury or benefit to the part not taken is also to be considered. When the part not taken is left in such shape or condition, as to be in itself of less value than before, the owner is entitled to additional damages on that account. When, on the other hand, the part which he retains is specially and directly increased in value by the public improvement, the damages to the whole parcel by the appropriation of part of it are lessened."167 U.S., at 574 ,17 S.Ct. 966 .
"The Constitution of the United States," the Court stated, "contains no express prohibition against considering benefits in estimating the just compensation to be paid for private property taken for the public use." Id.,at 584,
The Court has consistently applied this method for calculating just compensation: It sets off from the value of the portion that was taken the value of any benefits conferred upon the remaining portion of the property. See Regional Rail Reorganization Act Cases,
The rule applies regardless of whether a taking enhances the value of one property or the value of many properties. That is to say, the Government may "permi[t] consideration of actual benefits-enhancement in market value-flowing directly from a public work, although all in the neighborhood receive like advantages."McCoy v. Union Elevated R. Co.,
Of course, a State may prefer to guarantee a greater payment to property owners, for instance by establishing a standard for compensation that does not account for general benefits (or for any benefits) afforded to a property owner by a taking. See id.,at 365,
If we apply Baumanand its progeny to the marketing order's reserve requirement, "the benefit [to the free-tonnage raisins] may be set off against the value of the [reserve raisins] taken." Miller, supra,at 376,
*2436net loss was zero, the compensation that is due is also zero"). And even the Hornes agree that if the reserve requirement does not effect a taking without just compensation, then they cannot use the Takings Clause to excuse their failure to comply with the marketing order-or to justify their refusal to pay the fine and penalty imposed based on that failure. See Brief for Petitioners 31 ("The constitutionality of the fine rises or falls on the constitutionality of the Marketing Order's reserve requirement and attendant transfer of reserve raisins" (internal quotation marks omitted)).
II
The majority believes the Baumanline of cases most likely does not apply here. It says that those cases do "not create a generally applicable exception to the usual compensation rule, based on asserted regulatory benefits of the sort at issue here." Ante,at 2432. But it is unclear to me what distinguishes this case from those.
It seems unlikely that the majority finds a distinction in the fact that this taking is based on regulatory authority. Cf. Chrysler Corp. v. Brown,
Ultimately, the majority rejects the Government's request for a remand because it believes that the Government "does not suggest that the marketing order affords the Hornes compensation" in the amount of the fine that the Government assessed. Ante,at 2433. In my view, however, the relevant precedent indicates that the Takings Clause requires compensation in an amount equal to the value of the reserve raisins adjusted to account for the benefits received. And the Government does, indeed, suggest that the marketing order affords just compensation. See Brief for Respondent 56 ("It is likely that when all benefits and alleged losses from the marketing order are calculated, [the Hornes] would have a net gainrather than a net loss, given that a central point of the order is to benefit producers"). Further, the Hornes have not demonstrated the contrary. Before granting judgment in favor of the Hornes, a court should address the issue in light of all of the relevant facts and law.
* * *
Given the precedents, the parties should provide full briefing on this question. I would remand the case, permitting the lower courts to consider argument on the question of just compensation.
For these reasons, while joining Parts I and II of the Court's opinion, I respectfully dissent from Part III.
Dissenting Opinion
The Hornes claim, and the Court agrees, that the Raisin Marketing Order, 7 CFR pt. 989 (2015) (hereinafter Order), effects a per setaking under our decision in Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp.,
I
Our Takings Clause jurisprudence has generally eschewed "magic formula[s]" and has "recognized few invariable rules." Arkansas Game and Fish Comm'n v. United States,568 U.S. ----, ---- - ----,
In the "special context of land-use exactions," we have held that "government demands that a landowner dedicate an easement allowing public access to her property as a condition of obtaining a development permit" constitute takings unless the government demonstrates a nexus and rough proportionality between its demand and the impact of the proposed development. Lingle,
Finally-and this is the argument the Hornes do rely on-we have held that the government effects a per setaking when it requires a property owner to suffer a "permanent physical occupation" of his or her property. Loretto,
This strict rule is apparent from the reasoning in Lorettoitself. We explained that "[p]roperty rights in a physical thing have been described as the rights 'to possess, use and dispose of it.' " Id.,at 435,
By contrast, in the mine run of cases where governmental action impacts property rights in ways that do not chop through the bundle entirely, we have declined to apply per serules and have instead opted for the more nuanced Penn Centraltest. See, e.g.,Hodel v. Irving,
What our jurisprudence thus makes plain is that a claim of a Lorettotaking is a bold accusation that carries with it a heavy burden. To qualify as a per setaking under Loretto,the governmental action must be so completely destructive to the property owner's rights-all of them-as to render the ordinary, generally applicable protections of the Penn Centralframework either a foregone conclusion or unequal to the task. Simply put, the retention of even one property right that is not destroyed is sufficient to defeat a claim of a per se taking under Loretto.
II
A
When evaluating the Order under this rubric, it is important to bear two things in mind. The first is that Lorettois not concerned with whether the Order is a good idea now, whether it was ever a good idea, or whether it intrudes upon some property rights. The Order may well be an outdated, and by some lights downright silly, regulation. It is also no doubt intrusive. But whatever else one can say about the Order, it is not a per setaking if it does not result in the destruction of every property right. The second thing to keep in mind is the need for precision about whose property rights are at issue and about what property is at issue. Here, what is at issue are the Hornes' property rights in the raisins they own and that are subject to the reserve requirement. The Order therefore effects a per setaking under Lorettoif and only if each of the Hornes' property rights in the portion of raisins that the Order designated as reserve has been destroyed. If not, then whatever fate the Order may reach under some other takings test, it is not a per setaking.
The Hornes, however, retain at least one meaningful property interest in the reserve *2439raisins: the right to receive some money for their disposition. The Order explicitly provides that raisin producers retain the right to "[t]he net proceeds from the disposition of reserve tonnage raisins,"
Granted, this equitable distribution may represent less income than what some or all of the reserve raisins could fetch if sold in an unregulated market. In some years, it may even turn out (and has turned out) to represent no net income. But whether and when that occurs turns on market forces for which the Government cannot be blamed and to which all commodities-indeed, all property-are subject. In any event, we have emphasized that "a reduction in the value of property is not necessarily equated with a taking," Andrus,444 U.S., at 66, 100 S.Ct. 318that even "a significant restriction ... imposed on one means of disposing" of property is not necessarily a taking, id.,at 65, 100 S.Ct. 318and that not every " 'injury to property by governmental action' " amounts to a taking, PruneYard,
Moreover, when, as here, the property at issue is a fungible commodity for sale, the income that the property may yield is the property owner's most central interest. Cf. Ruckelshaus v. Monsanto Co.,
The conclusion that the Order does not effect a per setaking fits comfortably within our precedents. After all, we have observed that even "[r]egulations that bar trade in certain goods" altogether-for example, a ban on the sale of eagle feathers-may survive takings challenges. Andrus,444 U.S., at 67,
We made this principle even clearer in Lucas,when we relied on Andrusand said that where, as here, "property's only economically productive use is sale or manufacture for sale," a regulation could even "render [that] property economically worthless" without effecting a per setaking. Lucas,
B
The fact that at least one property right is not destroyed by the Order is alone sufficient to hold that this case does not fall within the narrow confines of Loretto. But such a holding is also consistent with another line of cases that, when viewed together, teach that the government may require certain property rights to be given up as a condition of entry into a regulated market without effecting a per setaking.
First, in Leonard & Leonard v. Earle,
Next, in Ruckelshaus v. Monsanto Co.,
Finally, in Yee v. Escondido,
Understood together, these cases demonstrate that the Government may condition the ability to offer goods in the market on the giving-up of certain property interests without effecting a per setaking.
III
The Court's contrary conclusion rests upon two fundamental errors. The first is the Court's breezy assertion that a per setaking has occurred because the Hornes "lose the entire 'bundle' of property rights in the appropriated raisins ... with the exception of" the retained interest in the equitable distribution of the proceeds from *2442the disposition of the reserve raisins. Ante,at 2427 - 2428. But if there is a property right that has not been lost, as the Court concedes there is, then the Order has notdestroyed each of the Hornes' rights in the reserve raisins and does not effect a per setaking. The Court protests that the retained interest is not substantial or certain enough. But while I see more value in that interest than the Court does, the bottom line is that Lorettodoes not distinguish among retained property interests that are substantial or certain enough to count and others that are not.
One virtue of the Lorettotest was, at least until today, its clarity. Under Loretto,a total destruction of all property rights constitutes a per setaking; anything less does not. See
The second overarching error in the Court's opinion arises from its reliance on what it views as the uniquely physical nature of the taking effected by the Order. This, it says, is why many of the cases having to do with so-called regulatory takings are inapposite. See ante,at 2428 - 2430. It is not the case, however, that Government agents acting pursuant to the Order are storming raisin farms in the dark of night to load raisins onto trucks. But see Tr. of Oral Arg. 30 (remarks of ROBERTS, C.J.). The Order simply requires the Hornes to set aside a portion of their raisins-a requirement with which the Hornes refused to comply. See
*2443The Hornes and the Court both concede that a cap on the quantity of raisins that the Hornes can sell would not be a per setaking. See ante,at 2428; Brief for Petitioners 23, 52. The Court's focus on the physical nature of the intrusion also suggests that merely arranging for the sale of the reserve raisins would not be a per setaking. The rub for the Court must therefore be not that the Government is doing these things, but that it is accomplishing them by the altogether understandable requirement that the reserve raisins be physically set aside. I know of no principle, however, providing that if the Government achieves a permissible regulatory end by asking regulated individuals or entities to physically move the property subject to the regulation, it has committed a per setaking rather than a potential regulatory taking. After all, in Monsanto,the data that the pesticide companies had to turn over to the Government was presumably turned over in some physical form, yet even the Court does not call Monsantoa physical takings case. It therefore cannot be that any regulation that involves the slightest physical movement of property is necessarily evaluated as a per setaking rather than as a regulatory taking.
The combined effect of these errors is to unsettle an important area of our jurisprudence. Unable to justify its holding under our precedents, the Court resorts to superimposing new limitations on those precedents, stretching the otherwise strict Lorettotest into an unadministrable one, and deeming regulatory takings jurisprudence irrelevant in some undefined set of cases involving government regulation of property rights. And it does all of this in service of eliminating a type of reserve requirement that is applicable to just a few commodities in the entire country-and that, in any event, commodity producers could vote to terminate if they wished. See Letter from Solicitor General to Clerk of Court (Apr. 29, 2015); 7 U.S.C. § 608c(16)(B);
* * *
Because a straightforward application of our precedents reveals that the Hornes have not suffered a per setaking, I would affirm the judgment of the Ninth Circuit. The Court reaches a contrary conclusion only by expanding our per setakings doctrine in a manner that is as unwarranted as it is vague. I respectfully dissent.
For example, in United States v. Miller,
The Court attempts to distinguish Leonard & Leonardbecause it involved wild oysters, not raisins. Ante,at 2430. That is not an inaccurate factual statement, but I do not find in Leonard & Leonardany suggestion that its holding turned on this or any other of the facts to which the Court now points. Indeed, the only citation the Court offers for these allegedly crucial facts is the Maryland Court of Appeals' opinion, not ours. See ante,at 2430.
The Court claims that Monsantois distinguishable for three reasons, none of which hold up. First, it seems, the Court believes the degree of the intrusion on property rights is greater here than in Monsanto. See ante,at 2430. Maybe, maybe not. But nothing in Monsantosuggests this is a relevant question, and the Court points to nothing saying that it is. Second, the Court believes that "[s]elling produce in interstate commerce" is not a government benefit. Ante,at 2430. Again, that may be true, but the Hornes are not simply selling raisins in interstate commerce. They are selling raisins in a regulated market at a price artificially inflated by Government action in that market. That is the benefit the Hornes receive, and it does not matter that they "would rather not have" received it. United States v. Sperry Corp.,
The Court points out that, in a footnote in Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp.,
The Court relies on Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council, Inc. v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency,
