## Facts

- Irving and Jeanette Stevens owned oceanfront property in Cannon Beach, Oregon, purchased in 1957.
- In 1989, they sought a permit to build a seawall on the “dry-sand” area between the high-tide line and the vegetation line, an area long used by the public for recreation.
- The City denied the permit.
- The Stevens sued the City and the State in Oregon court for inverse condemnation and due process violations under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments.
- They alleged the permit denial eliminated all economically beneficial use of the dry-sand portion, constituting a “total taking” under *Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council*.
- Oregon courts relied on an Oregon Supreme Court decision recognizing a customary public recreational right in the dry-sand area, concluding the Stevens’ title was subject to that limitation.

## Issues

1. Whether a regulation alleged to eliminate all economically beneficial use of part of a parcel is a compensable taking under *Lucas* when the State asserts the prohibited uses were never part of the owner’s title due to “background principles” of state property law.
2. Whether a state court’s reliance on a doctrine characterized as recently articulated to negate asserted private property rights constitutes an unforeseeable change in property law that violates the Takings Clause or due process.

## Decision

- The U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari, leaving the Oregon Supreme Court’s judgment in place.
- Justice Scalia, joined by Justice O’Connor, dissented from the denial of certiorari.
- The dissent argued the case warranted review because *Lucas* permits denial of compensation only when the limitation was truly a pre-existing background principle, not a later redefinition of property rights.
- The dissent warned that allowing states to defeat total-taking claims by relabeling restrictions as background principles would nullify *Lucas* and permit uncompensated deprivation of vested rights.

## Legal Principles

- Denial of certiorari resolves no merits question and leaves the lower court judgment intact without a binding Supreme Court merits ruling.
- Under *Lucas*, a regulation that denies all economically beneficial use is a per se taking unless the proscribed uses were already barred by background principles of the state’s property and nuisance law.
- State courts’ characterization of pre-existing limits on title can be outcome-determinative in total-taking claims; if the characterization is novel and retroactive, it may raise federal constitutional concerns.
- A dissent from denial of certiorari may articulate concerns about the interaction between state property-law development and federal takings constraints, but it is not controlling law.

## Conclusion

The Supreme Court declined to review Oregon’s application of a customary public beach-use limitation to defeat a claimed total taking, while a dissent argued that post hoc redefinitions of property rights labeled as “background principles” risk evading *Lucas* and potentially implicate takings and due process limits.


Stevens v. City of Cannon Beach, 510 U.S. 1207 (1994)