Gideon's Trumpet Continues to Sound

Gearing up for 2014, I came across a good read in a web magazine published by the International Right of Way Association.  The article is a conversation with a “Fierce Advocate for Just Compensation” – Gideon Kanner, Esq.  Kanner is a professor of law emeritus at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, and is our colleague as an emeritus member of Owners Counsel of America.  The article recounts Kanner’s forty-year career championing the rights of private property owners against the government, which, given the “thinly disguised contempt” owners’ counsel receives from the bench, “not a line of work for the faint of heart.”

The article notes that Kanner has decided to cease publishing Just Compensation a loose-leaf monthly periodical on the law of Eminent Domain that he’s offered since 1974.  Kanner will, however, continue to post on his blog, Gideon’s Trumpet. (While unrelated to property rights litigation, another good read is the book, Gideon’s Trumpet, by Anthony Lewis (1964), which recounts the tale of an indigent criminal defendant who took his case all the way to the United States Supreme Court, and won!  In Gideon v. Wainwright,the Court held that the Sixth Amendment guaranteed that a criminal defendant an attorney even if they could not afford one).

Kanner’s insightful postings will certainly aid us while we continue to fight the good fight in 2014!

Happy New Year to all!