Real Estate & Property Law

Justice Alito Is Coming To Town - Time To Re-Read His "Ceded Lands" Opinion

By Robert Thomas

As noted by my blogging colleagues, U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito is  coming to Honolulu next week to participate in the U.H. Law School's "jurist in residence" program, and to address the Bar. (Mark Murakami summarized several of Justice Alito's more important opinions here, and Tred Eyerly summarizes his opinions that relate to insurance law issued while he was a Circuit Judge here.)

Justice Alito will be speaking about "Top Things You May Not Know About the U.S. Supreme Court" on Wednesday, January 26, 2011 at 4:30 p.m. at the Hawaii Supreme Court courtroom.

Justice Alito's most "Hawaii-centric" opinion was in Hawaii v. Office of Hawaiian Affairs, 129 S. Ct. 1436 (2009), where he authored the opinion for a unanimous Court. In that case, the Court held that the United States held "absolute fee simple" title to Hawaii's ceded lands, and that Congress' 1992 Apology Resolution had no legal effect. The Court reversed the Hawaii Supreme Court's decision in an opinion that made short work of the Hawaii court's claim that the Resolution justified an injunction prohibiting the State from selling ceded lands until "final determination" of native Hawaiians' claims.

We analyzed Justice Alito's opinion here. [Disclosure: we filed an amicus brief in that case supporting the State's argument.] More about the case here, including all of the merits and amicus briefs, and our report on the oral arguments.

Full post as published by inversecondemnation on January 27, 2011 (boomark / email).