Conservatives have been attacking Biden’s suggestion that single-family zoning laws be eliminated or relaxed. They frequently call this a war on the suburbs, which is completely inaccurate. More significantly, the conservative argument is itself an attack on property rights. Tucker Carlson serves as an example.
Tucker takes exception to the claim that zoning has been used for the purpose of racial and economic segregation. The facts, however, are not on his side. The first zoning laws were explicitly racist and prohibited blacks from living in predominantly white neighborhoods and vice versa. When racial zoning was struck down, cities turned to single-family zoning to keep certain types of people of a community. Those who couldn’t afford a single-family home were unable to find housing in many communities. This included non-whites and low-income families of every race.
The sordid history of zoning is enough to condemn it, but the essential objection to zoning in any form is founded on the right to property—the freedom to produce, trade, and use material values. Zoning prohibits landowners from using their property as they choose. Only those land uses approved by the government are permitted. Tucker, however, is not concerned about property rights.
In June, he spoke about the HOME Act, a bill that would reduce federal funding to jurisdictions that prohibit apartment buildings or minimum lot sizes.
So you, under this law, are no longer in charge of how large your lot sizes can be. You have no control over anything. What’s the point of having a local government at that point?
Tucker conveniently evades the fact that it is zoning that dictates lot sizes, not the property owner. He conveniently ignores the fact that zoning removes control of a property’s use from the owner and vests that control in zoning officials.
Tucker doesn’t care about protecting property rights. He does about protecting the power of local governments to impose “community values” upon every resident. He doesn’t object to government officials dictating property use, unless those officials are in Washington. Indeed, he suggests that,
If you wanted to fix the affordable housing crisis, maybe you would prevent foreign governments from buying up residential housing, which they are doing, or Black Rock from buying up single-family homes and turning them into rentals.
Tucker believes that if someone does something that is offensive to others, then it should be prohibited. He doesn’t like big companies owning rental properties and wants government to put an end to it. But that shouldn’t be surprising, given the fact that he supports using government coercion to keep “undesirables” out of the suburbs.