MAXINE WATERS and John Cornyn don’t agree on much, but they do agree that government should not be acquiring private property for private economic development via eminent domain. They were both unnerved by the 2005 Supreme Court ruling in Kelo v. City of New London, which gave such takings a constitutional imprimatur. Soon afterward they teamed up to curb the reach of eminent domain laws and prevent Kelo from unleashing a raft of similar condemnations.

That Rep. Waters, a fiercely liberal Democrat from Los Angeles, and Sen. Cornyn, a dependably conservative Republican from Texas, should find such common ground might seem surprising. Indeed, Waters recognized that eminent domain reform would garner her some unlikely allies. As she testified to a House committee in September 2005, citing her work with local officials in California, “People are looking at us and saying, ‘What is it that brings liberal Maxine Waters together with this conservative supervisor out of Orange County?’ Well, you’re right, you won’t see that very often, but on this issue I think that you’re going to see a lot of it because . . . we all basically share a basic value of the right to ownership of our land and our homes.”