Harold Hitz Burton

“ The considerations that made it appropriate for the Constitution to declare that the Constitution of the United States, and the laws of the United States made in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land [9] make it appropriate to recognize that the power of eminent domain, when exercised by Congress within its constitutional powers, be equally supreme. ”

“ If the right to acquire property for such uses may be made a barren right by the unwillingness of property-holders to sell, or by the action of a State prohibiting a sale to the Federal government, the constitutional grants of power may be rendered nugatory, and the government is dependent for its practical existence upon the will of a State, or even upon that of a private citizen. ”

“ Even if the word 'arbitrary', as used by the District Court, was intended by it to have the ordinary meaning which that word has when used alone, we are unable to conclude on the record before us that the selection of the park site for a post office in Cape Girardeau, was, as a matter of law, capricious and arbitrary in any sense that, under any construction of the Acts before us, would invalidate the selection here made. ”

“ These cannot be preserved if the obstinacy of a private person, or if any other authority, can prevent the acquisition of the means or instruments by which alone governmental functions can be performed. The powers vested by the Constitution in the general government demand for their exercise the acquisition of lands in all the States. ”

“ It can neither be enlarged nor diminished by a State. Nor can any State prescribe the manner in which it must be exercised. The consent of a State can never be a condition precedent to its enjoyment.' (Italics supplied.) Kohl v. United States, supra, 91 U.S. 371, 372, 374, 23 L.Ed. 449.
The Kohl case approved the condemnation of privately owned land, then subject to a perpetual leasehold, for a post office site in Cincinnati, Ohio, under an Act of Congress expressly naming that City but not expressly naming the site. ”

“ This proceeding was instituted by the United States to condemn land as a site for a post office and customhouse in the City of Cape Girardeau, Missouri, in reliance upon several federal statutes, including the general Condemnation Act of August 1, 1888, and the Public Buildings Act of May 25, 1926. [1] The City and site were selected by the Federal Works Administrator and the Postmaster General acting jointly under the Public Buildings Act. ”

“ In such cases the absence of an express grant of superiority over conflicting public uses reflects an absence of such superiority. See United States v. Jotham Bixby Co., D.C., 55 F.2d 317, 319, affirmed sub nom., C.M. Patten & Co. ”