all economically beneficial or productive use of land

Anthony Palazzolo, a lifelong resident of Westerly, Rhode Island, formed Shore Gardens, Inc. (SGI) with associates in 1959 to purchase three undeveloped adjoining parcels along Atlantic Avenue bordering Winnapaug Pond to the north and the beach to the south. SGI subdivided the property into 80 lots in the 1960s and developed most into single-family homes, but left the petitioner's 20-acre parcel undeveloped. Most of the property consists of salt marsh subject to tidal flooding requiring substantial fill for structures. In 1971, Rhode Island created the Coastal Resources Management Council (CRMC) to regulate coastal development. In 1978, the CRMC promulgated regulations designating much of the property as protected coastal wetlands where filling is prohibited without a special exception. That same year SGI's corporate charter was revoked for unpaid taxes, transferring title to Palazzolo as sole shareholder. In 1983, Palazzolo applied to the CRMC to construct a bulkhead and fill the entire wetlands for a beach club, but the application was denied as vague and inadequate with significant environmental impacts. In 1985, he submitted a more specific proposal to fill 11 acres for a beach club including parking for 50 cars with trailers, dumpsters, port-a-johns, picnic tables, and barbecue pits, which the CRMC also rejected for failing to serve a compelling public purpose. Palazzolo filed an inverse condemnation action in Rhode Island Superior Court seeking $3,150,000 in damages based on the value of a 74-lot residential subdivision, alleging the regulations deprived him of all economically beneficial use. After a bench trial, the Superior Court ruled against him, finding the parcel retained $200,000 in development value on an upland portion. The Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed on multiple grounds, including lack of ripeness and that Palazzolo lacked standing to challenge pre-acquisition regulations. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the Rhode Island Supreme Court's decision.

In the early 1980s, the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency imposed two moratoria on development in the Lake Tahoe Basin. The first, Ordinance 81-5, took effect on August 24, 1981, and lasted until August 26, 1983. The second, Resolution 83-21, ran from August 27, 1983, to April 25, 1984. Together these measures prohibited virtually all development on sensitive lands for a total of 32 months while TRPA developed a comprehensive land-use plan. Lake Tahoe's exceptional water clarity had begun to deteriorate due to increased land development starting in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Runoff from impervious surfaces on steeper slopes and stream environment zones carried nutrients that promoted algae growth. In response, California and Nevada, along with the federal government, amended the Tahoe Regional Planning Compact in 1980 to require TRPA to establish environmental threshold carrying capacities and adopt a regional plan. The 1980 Compact amendment directed TRPA to adopt thresholds within 18 months and a plan within a year thereafter. It also included a finding that temporary halts on development were necessary to preserve the region's capacity for future development consistent with the ultimate plan. TRPA enacted Ordinance 81-5 in June 1981 after concluding it could not meet the original deadlines, and later adopted Resolution 83-21 when no plan was in place by August 1983. Petitioners, including the Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council representing about 2,000 owners and a class of approximately 400 individual owners of vacant lots purchased before 1980 primarily for building single-family homes, filed parallel actions in federal courts in Nevada and California shortly after the 1984 plan was adopted. The suits were consolidated in the District of Nevada. The District Court found that the moratoria constituted categorical takings under Lucas because they temporarily deprived owners of all economically viable use. The Ninth Circuit reversed that determination. The Ninth Circuit held that the temporary nature of the regulations meant no categorical taking had occurred and that Penn Central analysis applied, though petitioners had not challenged the District Court's Penn Central findings. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to address whether the moratoria effected per se takings.

Eastern Enterprises was organized as a Massachusetts business trust in 1929 under the name Eastern Gas and Fuel Associates. Until 1965, Eastern conducted extensive coal mining operations centered in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. As a signatory to each National Bituminous Coal Wage Agreement executed between 1947 and 1964, Eastern made contributions of over $60 million to the 1947 and 1950 Welfare and Retirement Funds. In 1963, Eastern decided to transfer its coal-related operations to a subsidiary, Eastern Associated Coal Corp. The transfer was completed by the end of 1965. It was described in Eastern's federal income tax return as an agreement by EACC to assume all of Eastern's liabilities arising out of coal mining and marketing operations in exchange for Eastern's receipt of EACC's stock. Eastern retained its stock interest in EACC through a subsidiary corporation, Coal Properties Corp., until 1987. It received dividends of more than $100 million from EACC during that period. In 1987, Eastern sold its interest in Coal Properties Corp. to Peabody Holding Company, Inc. Following enactment of the Coal Industry Retiree Health Benefit Act of 1992, the Commissioner of Social Security assigned to Eastern the obligation for Combined Fund premiums respecting over 1,000 retired miners who had worked for the company before 1966. The assignment rested on Eastern's status as the pre-1978 signatory operator for whom the miners had worked for the longest period of time. Eastern's premium for a 12-month period exceeded $5 million. Eastern responded by suing the Commissioner, as well as the Combined Fund and its trustees, in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Eastern asserted that the Coal Act, either on its face or as applied, violates substantive due process and constitutes a taking of its property in violation of the Fifth Amendment. The District Court granted summary judgment for respondents on all claims. The Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

In Florida, the State owns in trust for the public the land permanently submerged beneath navigable waters and the foreshore, making the mean high-water line the ordinary boundary between private beachfront property and state-owned land. Littoral owners hold special rights with regard to the water and foreshore, including the right to receive accretions and relictions to their property. In 1961, Florida’s Legislature passed the Beach and Shore Preservation Act, which sets procedures for beach restoration and nourishment projects to deposit sand on eroded beaches. A local government may apply to the Department of Environmental Protection for funds and permits, and when placing fill on the State’s submerged lands, authorization from the Board of Trustees of the Internal Improvement Trust Fund is required. Once a beach restoration is determined to be undertaken, the Board sets an erosion control line that replaces the fluctuating mean high-water line as the boundary between privately owned littoral property and state property, after which the common law ceases to increase upland property by accretion. In 2003, the city of Destin and Walton County applied for permits to restore 6.9 miles of beach within their jurisdictions that had been eroded by several hurricanes. The project would add about 75 feet of dry sand seaward of the mean high-water line. The Department issued a notice of intent to award the permits, and the Board approved the erosion-control line. Stop the Beach Renourishment, Inc., a nonprofit corporation formed by people who own beachfront property bordering the project area, brought an administrative challenge to the proposed project. After the challenge proved unsuccessful and the Department approved the permits, the corporation challenged the action in state court under the Florida Administrative Procedure Act. The District Court of Appeal for the First District set aside the Department’s final order and certified a question to the Florida Supreme Court. The Florida Supreme Court answered the certified question in the negative and quashed the First District’s remand. Petitioner sought rehearing on the ground that the Florida Supreme Court’s decision itself effected a taking of the Members’ littoral rights contrary to the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, but the request for rehearing was denied. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the case.

The Murr family petitioners are two sisters and two brothers who own two adjacent lots along the Lower St. Croix River in Troy, Wisconsin. Their parents purchased Lot F in 1960, transferred it to the family plumbing company, and purchased neighboring Lot E in 1963, holding it in their own names. The parents conveyed Lot F to the petitioners in 1994 and Lot E in 1995. The lots are contiguous, with similar topography featuring a steep bluff that limits developable land to less than one acre on each lot despite their 1.25-acre sizes. In 1972, the St. Croix River received federal protection under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, prompting Wisconsin to authorize rules in 1976 that limit development to preserve the river's scenic qualities. The regulations require at least one acre of suitable land for separate building sites and include a merger provision that bars the separate sale or development of adjacent substandard lots under common ownership. A grandfather clause preserves the right to develop substandard lots that were in separate ownership on the regulation's effective date of January 1, 1976. After the lots came under common ownership through the 1994 and 1995 transfers, the merger rules prevented the petitioners from selling or developing Lot E separately. The petitioners sought variances from the St. Croix County Board of Adjustment to allow separate sale or use of the lots and to relocate the cabin on Lot F, but the board denied the requests. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals upheld the denial, determining that the ordinance effectively merged the lots. The petitioners then filed an action in the Circuit Court of St. Croix County, claiming the regulations effected a regulatory taking by depriving them of all or practically all use of Lot E. The parties submitted appraisals showing a combined regulated value of $698,300, a value of $771,000 if treated as two buildable lots, $373,000 for Lot F alone with improvements, and $40,000 for Lot E as undevelopable. The circuit court granted summary judgment to the respondents, noting that the petitioners retained options such as preserving or relocating the cabin or building a new residence on the combined property, and that the value decrease was less than 10 percent. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment, holding that the takings analysis must consider the petitioners' property as a whole rather than Lot E in isolation. The court found that the petitioners could not reasonably expect separate treatment of the lots given the regulations in place when they acquired them. The Supreme Court of Wisconsin denied discretionary review, after which the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the definition of the parcel in this regulatory takings context.