Sep 13, 2013 2 min read

In celebration of Constitution Day, the Stover Scholars at Waynesburg University will present “Constitutionally Condemned: Susette Kelo’s Takings Clause Battle to Keep her Pink House,” Tuesday, September 17, at noon in the Goodwin Performing Arts Center. Admission is free, and the public is cordially invited to attend.

“By dramatizing Susette Kelo’s failed Fifth Amendment Takings Clause battle to keep her pink house, the Stover Scholars portray the pivotal importance for all people of property rights protections in the constitutional order,” said Dr. Lawrence M. Stratton, director of the Stover Center for Constitutional Studies and Moral Leadership and assistant professor of ethics and constitutional law. “The Stover Scholars are to be commended for writing the play and thereby bringing Ms. Kelo’s legal story to life.”

Written by three Waynesburg University Stover Scholars, Nika Anschuetz, Chase Ayers and Daniel Czajkowski, “Constitutionally Condemned: Susette Kelo’s Takings Clause Battle to Keep her Pink House” dramatizes property owner Susette Kelo’s battle to keep her New London, Conn., home in the face of a redevelopment plan involving the New London and Connecticut governments and Pfizer Corporation.

Kelo and her attorneys argued the development plan did not qualify as a “public use” under the U.S. Constitution’s Fifth Amendment Takings Clause, which states that “Nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation,” taking the case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Although Kelo’s constitutional challenge failed before a closely divided Supreme Court, she catalyzed a national movement to reinvigorate property rights in the United States.

Directed by Edward L. Powers, professor of theater, and presented by the Stover Center for Constitutional Studies and Moral Leadership, the play brings to life the passions and conflicts of Kelo’s case as well as the critical jurisprudential issues facing the Supreme Court.