"The city has carefully formulated an economic development that it believes will provide appreciable benefits to the community," Justice John Paul Stevens wrote in an opinion joined by Justices Anthony Kennedy, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer. "Promoting economic development is a traditional and long accepted function of government."

In the dissent, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote, "Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms." She was joined in the dissent by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

"Given the court's prior jurisprudence, the outcome in this case was not surprising," says Peter G. Verniero, who chairs Newark-based Sills Cummis Epstein & Gross' Appellate Practice Group and is co-chair of the firm's Corporate Internal Investigations and Business Crimes Practice Group. He also formerly served as a justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court as well as state Attorney General. "Still, the fact that four members of the court, including Justice O'Connor, often the swing-vote in controversial cases, strongly dissented could mean that the issue could be revisited in some future case. For now, however, the Kelo ruling should bring a measure of certainty to condemnation proceedings throughout the Unites States, with courts deferring to state or local governmental decisions to a wide extent."For Verniero's case notes, click here.