61 
funded by Congyess.18 The major faults are traceable to the pre- 
requisites for issuance of the guarantee, which include such things as 
a socially and economically mixed developments with a wider 
range of housing choice and community facilities.1? Although these 
items are clearly desirable from a public interest standpoint, it is 
questionable whether they can be provided without substantially 
more subsidy than that created by the guarantee.*° 
Pusuic INVOLVEMENT IN NEw Community DEVELOPMENT: LEGAL 
CONSTITUTIONAL, AND Po.mitrcaL IssuES 
A. THE PUBLIC PURPOSE DILEMMA 
The chronic refusal to see the land problem in anything but a 
restricted and archaic perspective may well be one of the contributing 
factors to our modern economic incoherencies. Surely it is an indication 
of myopia to cast about for social patterns and to plan political struc- 
tures without so much as a glance at the very obvious basis of economic 
life. There are programs and programs, all of them seemingly founded 
on the proposition that industry and capital and finances are ethereal 
essences floating about balloonlike and designing no commerce with 
the ground. There are books and books on economics, every week a 
new batch. In how many of them will you find the word “land” 
mentioned in the indexes? Perhaps Chesterton complamed correctly 
when he found that the man in Bedford is not conscious of Bed- 
fordshire. Our urban population have completely forgotten that we 
all live on the land.” 
1. Present wse: The nature of the problem 
In much of the literature concerning the potential role of American 
governments in new community development there seems to be an 
implicit assumption that not only is it a good idea for government to 
be involved in controlling, acquiring, or developing land for new com- 
munities, but that all of these actions are permissible as well. Such an 
assumption, without reference to specific laws, intuitively seems accept- 
able, particularly in a country like the United States, where, in less 
than two centuries, government has managed to dispose of over 1 
billion acres of public land either by gifts or by sales at reduced prices.” 
Thus, it does seem implausible to assume that a government, capable 
of disposing of so much land, should not also be capable of reacquiring 
land for new community development. The plausibility of this con- 
clusion notwithstanding a cursory survey of the relevant law should 
suggest to even the most casual reader the existence of so many 
constraints that it would be dangerous to assume such power without 
further investigation. 
Perhaps this point can be made more lucid by examining closely 
some statements from the new community literature. In probably the 
“8 See statement of Charles M. Haar, professor of law, Harvard University, before the House Committee 
on Banking and Currency, Oct. 22, 1969. 
19 See new regulations promulgated by HUD for title 1V, February 1970. 
20 For an idea of what title IV was conceived of as being (before it was run through the legislative wringer) , 
see Mortimer Zuckerman, “The Zurban Report’, confidential memorandum prepared for the President’s 
Task Force on the development of New Town’s legislation, fall 1967. 
21 GQ. R. Geiger, ‘“The Theory of the Land Question,” Macmillan Co., New York (1936), p. 5. 
22 Extrapolated from data in Sakolski, op. cit., p. 173. 
