On April 14, 1999 the Monmouth County League of Women Voters and
Brookdale Community College co-sponsored a roundtable discussion on Critical
Land Use Challenges in Monmouth County. The following is excerpted from
a statement submitted by the Monmouth County Libertarian Party:
What is the purpose behind land use planning? Is
it to implement some vision of an ideal environment? To put into practice
some nice-sounding theory? I would think our goal would be an approach
that allows the maximum number of people to get the maximum amount of pleasure
and benefit out of what is, in the final analysis, their private property.
And the free market does just that.
We have before our eyes the sad result of history's
greatest attempt at centralized, government-directed land use planning.
It is, of course, the ruined, toxic waste of the former Soviet Union and,
indeed, much of Eastern Europe. Is this what we want our environment to
look like? Why would any version of government regulated land use here
in our country yield a better result than what could be achieved by what
was then the world's only other superpower?
The owners of the land will always, in the end,
be the best stewards of the land, and the market place the most efficient
way to allocate resources and direct development.
Our position on private property in general is summarized as follows
in the NJ Libertarian Party platform:
We hold that the owners of the property have the
full right to control, use, dispose of, or in any manner enjoy, their property
without interference, until and unless the exercise of their control infringes
upon the rights of others...
We oppose all violations of the right to private
property, liberty of contract, and freedom of trade. We also condemn government
efforts to regulate or ban the use of property under the pretexts of aesthetic
values, risk, "public safety", moral standards, social cost/benefit analyses,
or the promotion or restriction of economic growth. We demand an end to
the taxation of privately owned real property, which actually makes the
state the owner of all lands and forces individuals to rent their homes
and places of business from the state. We deplore the taking the taking
of private property for government use under eminent domain.
The massive seizure of control of private property
in New Jersey's Pinelands by government is a violation of individual rights.
We advocate the immediate repeal of all Pinelands Commission, creation
of private property rights in clean water to control pollution, and liquidation
of government-held property in New Jersey through restoration to rightful
owners, sale or homesteading.