Politics & Power Quote by Michael Kinsley

Kinsley’s trick here is to dress a deeply ideological fight in the costume of a niche hobby: “takings fans.” The phrase is a sly wink at the small but fervent class of lawyers, policy wonks, and property-rights absolutists who follow eminent domain the way others follow playoff brackets. By naming them, he’s also needling them, implying their excitement is a little unseemly given what’s at stake: people’s homes, neighborhoods, and political power.

The real pivot is the contrast he draws: not compensation, but “public purpose.” Compensation is the technocratic part of eminent domain, the check-writing after the bulldozers arrive. “Public purpose” is the moral battleground, the line between a state acting for shared needs and a state laundering private benefit through public authority. Kinsley is flagging a strategic shift: if you can’t win by arguing the price was too low, you try to win by arguing the taking itself was illegitimate.

The subtext is post-Kelo anxiety without naming it: the fear that “public” has become elastic enough to include almost any development pitch with projected jobs and tax revenue. Kinsley’s framing suggests a courtroom drama where the interesting question isn’t how much the government owes you, but whether the government’s stated rationale deserves belief. The quote works because it exposes how constitutional language becomes a proxy for class, land, and legitimacy - with “public purpose” serving as the respectable mask for a much rawer fight over whose interests count as public.