As early as tomorrow, the House will try to set straight what the Supreme Court got wrong last spring when lawmakers vote on a bill to curb eminent domain abuse. The legislation, introduced by Rep. James Sensenbrenner with a list of cosponsors so bipartisan that it unites John Conyers and Maxine Waters with Tom DeLay and Mike Pence, would cut off federal economic development aid for two years for any state, county, or city that used the power of eminent domain to transfer property to one private entity from another solely for “economic development.”

Congress is trying to re-bottle the genie the Supreme Court released in its ruling in Kelo v. New London. For generations, eminent domain had been used by the state to secure land on which to build roads or dig sewers to erect power lines. The Fifth Amendment anticipated this type of seizure for the common good, but added that “nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

In Kelo, the Supreme Court sanctioned a more expansive definition of “public use,” ruling that it’s acceptable to redistribute property based on which owner will use the land for “economic development,” which seems like code for “create more taxable value to line government coffers.” The House bill, called the Private Property Rights Protection Act, seeks to re-impose the Founders’s stricter notion of “pub lic use.”

Lawmakers propose to exploit the power of the federal purse to keep local governments into compliance. It’s a solution even federalism purists can embrace, notes one of the measure’s supporters, Scott LaGanga, the head of the conservative Property Rights Alliance. The bill “does only what the federal government should do – withhold money,” says Mr. LaGanga, whose group is affiliated with Americans for Tax Reform. Congress is exercising its constitutional duty as a coequal branch of government to protect the rights of Americans. This in and of itself is an important consideration since, as Kelo proved, it falls not only to the courts to serve as constitutional arbiters.

If local politicians object to the strictures contained in this bill they can opt out of receiving federal economic development money. But it might not come to that. This Congressional action comes as many states and localities are waging their own legislative battles against the abuse of eminent domain, including here in New York, as we noted in our editorial of October 5, “The Eminent Domain Fight-Back.” It’s too soon to say precisely how passage of the federal bill will affect the Empire State, but there has been plenty of abuse here, including the new building of the New York Times, a project in which eminent domain was used to award property to a powerful business family after it was seized from a less powerful private owner.