Rector's Reflection—3 Pentecost, Proper 6
June 13, 2010
To be filed under the title: Everything New is Old Again...
The final (well, maybe just almost final) chapter in the eminent domain battle that raged in
New London, CT, was written in November of last year. If you don't remember the battle, it went
something like this:
Economic development officials in New London wanted to lure pharma giant Pfizer to their
town, so they devised a financial incentive package that included dramatic property tax reductions
for ten years. The officials also created the New London Development Corporation to buy up a nine-acre
neighborhood near the Pfizer campus and to find a developer who would replace the old
neighborhood with a shopper- and tourist-drawing "urban village." The city then embarked upon
a plan to exercise its power of eminent domain... which led to a lawsuit (Kelo v. New London)...
which ended up in the Supreme Court in 2005... which decided that it was OK to take over private
property and give it to developers to bolster the economy. Outrage across the country led to all sorts
of legislation around the country to strengthen the protection of private property rights—moves too
late for some New London residents.
Last November, Pfizer announced that, following its acquisition of Wyeth, it would move
its operation to Groton, CT, eliminating over 1,400 local jobs and leaving a massive building and
a totally undeveloped, razed nine acres where once a neighborhood stood.
Later the following events took place: Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard in Jezreel, beside
the palace of King Ahab of Samaria. And Ahab said to Naboth, "Give me your vineyard, so that I
may have it for a vegetable garden, because it is near my house; I will give you a better vineyard for
it; or, if it seems good to you, I will give you its value in money." But Naboth said to Ahab, "The
LORD forbid that I should give you my ancestral inheritance."
This was an answer that set in motion for
Naboth a much grimmer exercising of the right of eminent domain.
The big difference between Ahab and New London, CT, is... well... is there one? Of course
there are differences in details (and New London didn't stone anybody—so far as we know) but for
me they are show-and-tell-worthy examples of what the tenth commandment says: "You shall not
covet your neighbor's house (among other things)." You see, coveting is not about admiring what
someone else has or wanting something LIKE someone else has. Coveting is wanting what someone
else has to the extent that the other person DOESN'T have it.
Coveting endangers social order because intense greed can escalate faster than a NASA
rocket at lift-off. It disregards relationships. It fractures covenants. And, at least for Ahab, coveting
grew into a violation of the ninth commandment (the one about false witness) and the sixth (the one
about murder), followed quickly by violations of the first and second commandments (the ones about
having no other gods and idolatry). Covetousness is a form of idolatry because it places priorities
and desires before God, and, in some cases, substitutes them for God.
I am not suggesting that the parties in the eminent domain debacle (my word) and Ahab are
parallels, but they both highlight the skewed results than can ensue when there are transactions
between radically unequal partners. Moreover, they are reminders that in every generation there will
be those who promote or exploit technicalities for "personal" gain. Elijah warned that it was ill-advised
to manipulate legal and religious institutions for greed because nothing escapes God's
notice. Maybe that's where the parallel is.
Susan+
