Signed: Dan Moser
Newswise —
America has been shaped and shaped by property law since its founding. It is a unique history that balances ideals of individual freedom with a complex history of property deprivation. But property law experts at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln say current trends in other countries may offer new perspectives on how to imagine future approaches.
Jessica A. Shoemaker, Steinhardt Foundation Distinguished Professor of Law, will provide insight into land justice in rural America at the Nebraska Fall Lecture, “Fundamental Principles: How Property Makes the Rural,” Nov. 12. was unveiled.
Throughout history, land has proven essential for building livelihoods and communities, and property law has emerged from “social and political struggles over how we order ourselves.” Shoemaker said.
“Property law is literally the fundamental principles that govern, in the most fundamental way, how access to and control of one of our most precious resources is allocated and managed,” she said. “Our landscapes are profoundly influenced and shaped by private property laws.”
American property law broke away from the feudal power structures that had governed land ownership in Europe and, through the Homestead Act in particular, empowered people, primarily white men, to live, improve, and ultimately was given land to own.
This tradition was built on the sacrifices of others, including decades of slavery and dispossession of Indigenous peoples, Shoemaker said.
As property law matures in the United States, it governs the rights of individual owners to determine how their land is used, who has access to it, and what they are allowed to do with it. has been primarily regarded. Property law is intertwined with concepts such as personal liberty, independence, privacy, and freedom from government interference.
But real estate is more complicated than that, Shoemaker said. “We don’t live on an island.”
Property law governs not only the rights of landowners, but also their responsibilities. Property rights shape and specify social relationships and can evoke strong emotions, she said.
The struggle for civil rights for black people in the 20th century was also a struggle over property law. Ongoing issues surrounding the forced removal of indigenous peoples, the treatment of black farmers, and environmental issues remind us that land justice is a complex element in how property law in the United States has developed. I keep doing it.
Today, as farmland moves from a place where people live and produce food to an asset for non-resident investors, who owns rural land? Is it Bill Gates or the Chinese government? This concern has become a source of concern. There are approximately 300 private equity firms in the United States that specialize in food and agriculture.
Finding affordable land is the biggest challenge young farmers face.
Examples from other countries may point the way to new approaches in the United States.
In Canada, land and resources for Indigenous peoples are determined by agreements between the government and First Nations. In Scotland, the Right to Life movement aims to address the lack of affordable property in rural areas by giving young people the legal right to live in the communities where they were born and raised. And in the UK, there is a mildly agitated movement promoting “trespassers’ rights” as a call for greater public access to nature.
Shoemaker said that in pursuing land justice through property law, “our imagination is the only limit.”
The Nebraska Lecture: The Chancellor’s Distinguished Speaker Series is sponsored by the Office of the Chancellor and the Research Council’s Office of Research and Innovation in collaboration with the Osher Institute for Lifelong Learning and is held once a semester. This lecture connects the University community with the larger community within and beyond Lincoln, celebrates the University’s intellectual life, and showcases excellence in the research and creative work of its faculty.
A recording of Shoemaker’s talk will be posted on the Nebraska Lectures website within a week of the talk.
