First English Evangelical Lutheran Church v. County of Los Angeles

482 U.S. 304, 107 S. Ct. 2378, 96 L. Ed. 2d 250, 1987 U.S. LEXIS 2606, 55 U.S.L.W. 4781, 17 Envtl. L. Rep. (Envtl. Law Inst.) 20787, 26 ERC (BNA) 1001

• Court: Supreme Court of the United States
• Decided: June 9, 1987
• Docket: 85-1199
• Status: Published

Opinions

Chief Justice Rehnquist

delivered the opinion of the Court.

In this case the California Court of Appeal held that a landowner who claims that his property has been “taken” by a land-use regulation may not recover damages for the time before it is finally determined that the regulation constitutes a “taking” of his property. We disagree, and conclude that in these circumstances the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution would require compensation for that period.

In 1957, appellant First English Evangelical Lutheran Church purchased a 21-acre parcel of land in a canyon along the banks of the Middle Fork of Mill Creek in the Angeles National Forest. The Middle Fork is the natural drainage channel for a watershed area owned by the National Forest Service. Twelve of the acres owned by the church are flat land, and contained a dining hall, two bunkhouses, a caretaker’s lodge, an outdoor chapel, and a footbridge across the creek. The church operated on the site a campground, known as “Lutherglen,” as a retreat center and a recreational area for handicapped children.

In July 1977, a forest fire denuded the hills upstream from Lutherglen, destroying approximately 3,860 acres of the watershed area and creating a serious flood hazard. Such flooding occurred on February 9 and 10, 1978, when a storm dropped 11 inches of rain in the watershed. The runoff from the storm overflowed the banks of the Mill Creek, flooding Lutherglen and destroying its buildings.

In response to the flooding of the canyon, appellee County of Los Angeles adopted Interim Ordinance No. 11,855 in January 1979. The ordinance provided that “[a] person shall not construct, reconstruct, place or enlarge any building or structure, any portion of which is, or will be, located within the outer boundary lines of the interim flood protection area located in Mill Creek Canyon '. . . .” App. to Juris. Statement A31. The ordinance was effective immediately because the county determined that it was “required for the immediate preservation of the public health and safety . . . .” Id., at A32. The interim flood protection area described by the ordinance included the flat areas on either side of Mill Creek on which Lutherglen had stood.

The church filed a complaint in the Superior Court of California a little more than a month after the ordinance was adopted. As subsequently amended, the complaint alleged two claims against the county and the Los Angeles County Flood Control District. The first alleged that the defendants were liable under Cal. Govt. Code Ann. § 835 (West 1980)¹ for dangerous conditions on their upstream properties that contributed to the flooding of Lutherglen. As a part of this claim, appellant also alleged that “Ordinance No. 11,855 denies [appellant] all use of Lutherglen.” App. 12, 49. The second claim sought to recover from the Flood Control District in inverse condemnation and in tort for engaging in cloud seeding during the storm that flooded Lutherglen. Appellant sought damages under each count for loss of use of Lutherglen. The defendants moved to strike the portions of the complaint alleging that the county’s ordinance denied all use of Lutherglen, on the view that the California Supreme Court’s decision in Agins v. Tiburon, 24 Cal. 3d 266, 598 P. 2d 25 (1979), aff’d on other grounds, 447 U. S. 255 (1980), rendered the allegation “entirely immaterial and irrelevant^ with] no bearing upon any conceivable cause of action herein.” App. 22. See Cal. Civ. Proc. Code Ann. § 436(a) (West Supp. 1987) (“The court may. . . [s]trike out any irrelevant, false, or improper matter inserted in any pleading”).

In Agins v. Tiburon, supra, the California Supreme Court decided that a landowner may not maintain an inverse condemnation suit in the courts of that State based upon a “regulatory” taking. 24 Cal. 3d, at 275-277, 598 P. 2d, at 29-31. In the court’s view, maintenance of such a suit would allow a landowner to force the legislature to exercise its power of eminent domain. Under this decision, then, compensation is not required until the challenged regulation or ordinance has been held excessive in an action for declaratory relief or a writ of mandamus and the government has nevertheless decided to continue the regulation in effect. Based on this decision, the trial court in the present case granted the motion to strike the allegation that the church had been denied all use of Lutherglen. It explained that “a careful rereading of the Agins case persuades the Court that when an ordinance, even a non-zoning ordinance, deprives a person of the total use of his lands, his challenge to the ordinance is by way of declaratory relief or possibly mandamus.” App. 26. Because the appellant alleged a regulatory taking and sought only damages, the allegation that the ordinance denied all use of Lutherglen was deemed irrelevant.²

On appeal, the California Court of Appeal read the complaint as one seeking “damages for the uncompensated taking of all use of Lutherglen by County Ordinance No. 11,855 . . . .” App. to Juris. Statement A13-A14. It too relied on the California Supreme Court’s decision in Agins in rejecting the cause of action, declining appellant’s invitation to reevaluate Agins in light of this Court’s opinions in San Diego Gas & Electric Co. v. San Diego, 450 U. S. 621 (1981). The court found itself obligated to follow Agins “because the United States Supreme Court has not yet ruled on the question of whether a state may constitutionally limit the remedy for a taking to nonmonetary relief . . . .” App. to Juris. Statement A16. It accordingly affirmed the trial court’s decision to strike the allegations concerning appellee’s ordinance.³ The California Supreme Court denied review.

This appeal followed, and we noted probable jurisdiction. 478 U. S. 1003 (1986). Appellant asks us to hold that the California Supreme Court erred in Agins v. Tiburón in determining that the Fifth Amendment, as made applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, does not require compensation as a remedy for “temporary” regulatory takings — those regulatory takings which are ultimately invalidated by the courts.⁴ Four times this decade, we have considered similar claims and have found ourselves for one reason or another unable to consider the merits of the Agins rule. See MacDonald, Sommer & Frates v. Yolo County, 477 U. S. 340 (1986); Williamson County Regional Planning Comm’n v. Hamilton Bank, 473 U. S. 172 (1985); San Diego Gas & Electric Co., supra; Agins v. Tiburon, supra. For the reasons explained below, however, we find the constitutional claim properly presented in this case, and hold that on these facts the California courts have decided the compensation question inconsistently with the requirements of the Fifth Amendment.

I

Concerns with finality left us unable to reach the remedial question in the earlier cases where we have been asked to consider the rule of Agins. See MacDonald, Sommer & Frates, supra, at 351 (summarizing cases). In each of these cases, we concluded either that regulations considered to be in issue by the state court did not effect a taking, Agins v. Tiburon, 447 U. S., at 263, or that the factual disputes yet to be resolved by state authorities might still lead to the conclu-ion that no taking had occurred. MacDonald, Sommer & Frates, supra, at 351-353; Williamson County, supra, at 188-194; San Diego Gas & Electric Co., supra, at 631-632. Consideration of the remedial question in those circumstances, we concluded, would be premature.

The posture of the present case is quite different. Appellant’s complaint alleged that “Ordinance No. 11,855 denies [it] all use of Lutherglen,” and sought damages for this deprivation. App. 12, 49. In affirming the decision to strike this allegation, the Court of Appeal assumed that the complaint sought “damages for the uncompensated taking of all use of Lutherglen by County Ordinance No. 11,855.” App. to Juris. Statement A13-A14 (emphasis added). It relied on the California Supreme Court’s Agins decision for the conclusion that “the remedy for a taking [is limited] to nonmonetary relief . . . .” App. to Juris. Statement A16 (emphasis added). The disposition of the case on these grounds isolates the remedial question for our consideration. The rejection of appellant’s allegations did not rest on the view that they were false. Cf. MacDonald, Sommer & Frates, supra, at 352-353, n. 8 (California court rejected allegation in the complaint that appellant was deprived of all beneficial use of its property); Agins v. Tiburon, supra, at 259, n. 6 (same). Nor did the court rely on the theory that regulatory measures such as Ordinance No. 11,855 may never constitute a taking in the constitutional sense. Instead, the claims were deemed irrelevant solely because of the California Supreme Court’s decision in Agins that damages are unavailable to redress a “temporary” regulatory taking.⁵ The California Court of Appeal has thus held that, regardless of the correctness of appellant’s claim that the challenged ordinance denies it “all use of Lutherglen,” appellant may not recover damages until the ordinance is finally declared unconstitutional, and then only for any period after that declaration for which the county seeks to enforce it. The constitutional question pretermitted in our earlier cases is therefore squarely presented here.⁶

We reject appellee’s suggestion that, regardless of the state court’s treatment of the question, we must independently evaluate the adequacy of the complaint and resolve the takings claim on the merits before we can reach the remedial question. However “cryptic” — to use appellee’s description — the allegations with respect to the taking were, the California courts deemed them sufficient to present the issue. We accordingly have no occasion to decide whether the ordinance at issue actually denied appellant all use of its property⁷ or whether the county might avoid the conclusion that a compensable taking had occurred by establishing that the denial of all use was insulated as a part of the State’s authority to enact safety regulations. See, e. g., Goldblatt v. Hempstead, 369 U. S. 590 (1962); Hadacheck v. Sebastian, 239 U. S. 394 (1915); Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U. S. 623 (1887). These questions, of course, remain open for decision on the remand we direct today. We now turn to the question whether the Just Compensation Clause requires the government to pay for “temporary” regulatory takings.⁸

I — I I — I

Consideration of the compensation question must begin with direct reference to the language of the Fifth Amendment, which provides in relevant part that “private property [shall not] be taken for public use, without just compensation.” As its language indicates, and as the Court has frequently noted, this provision does not prohibit the taking of private property, but instead places a condition on the exercise of that power. See Williamson County, 473 U. S., at 194; Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining & Reclamation Assn., Inc., 452 U. S. 264, 297, n. 40 (1981); Hurley v. Kincaid, 285 U. S. 95, 104 (1932); Monongahela Navigation Co. v. United States, 148 U. S. 312, 336 (1893); United States v. Jones, 109 U. S. 513, 518 (1883). This basic understanding of the Amendment makes clear that it is designed not to limit the governmental interference with property rights per se, but rather to secure compensation in the event of otherwise proper interference amounting to a taking. Thus, government action that works a taking of property rights necessarily implicates the “constitutional obligation to pay just compensation.” Armstrong v. United States, 364 U. S. 40, 49 (1960).

We have recognized that a landowner is entitled to bring an action in inverse condemnation as a result of ‘“the self-executing character of the constitutional provision with respect to compensation . . . United States v. Clarke, 445 U. S. 253, 257 (1980), quoting 6 P. Nichols, Eminent Domain §25.41 (3d rev. ed. 1972). As noted in Justice Brennan’s dissent in San Diego Gas & Electric Co., 450 U. S., at 654-655, it has been established at least since Jacobs v. United States, 290 U. S. 13 (1933), that claims for just compensation are grounded in the Constitution itself:

“The suits were based on the right to recover just compensation for property taken by the United States for public use in the exercise of its power of eminent domain. That right was guaranteed by the Constitution. The fact that condemnation proceedings were not instituted and that the right was asserted in suits by the owners did not change the essential nature of the claim. The form of the remedy did not qualify the right. It rested upon the Fifth Amendment. Statutory recognition was not necessary. A promise to pay was not necessary. Such a promise was implied because of the duty to pay imposed by the Amendment. The suits were thus founded upon the Constitution of the United States.” Id., at 16. (Emphasis added.)

Jacobs, moreover, does not stand alone, for the Court has frequently repeated the view that, in the event of a taking, the compensation remedy is required by the Constitution. See, e. g., Kirby Forest Industries, Inc. v. United States, 467 U. S. 1, 5 (1984); United States v. Causby, 328 U. S. 256, 267 (1946); Seaboard Air Line R. Co. v. United States, 261 U. S. 299, 304-306 (1923); Monongahela Navigation, supra, at 327.⁹

It has also been established doctrine at least since Justice Holmes’ opinion for the Court in Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U. S. 393 (1922), that “[t]he general rule at least is, that while property may be regulated to a certain extent, if regulation goes too far it will be recognized as a taking.” Id., at 415. While the typical taking occurs when the government acts to condemn property in the exercise of its power of eminent domain, the entire doctrine of inverse condemnation is predicated on the proposition that a taking may occur without such formal proceedings. In Pumpelly v. Green Bay Co., 13 Wall. 166, 177-178 (1872), construing a provision in the Wisconsin Constitution identical to the Just Compensation Clause, this Court said:

“It would be a very curious and unsatisfactory result, if ... it shall be held that if the government refrains from the absolute conversion of real property to the uses of the public it can destroy its value entirely, can inflict irreparable and permanent injury to any extent, can, in effect, subject it to total destruction without making any compensation, because, in the narrowest sense of that word, it is not taken for the public use.”

Later cases have unhesitatingly applied this principle. See, e. g., Kaiser Aetna v. United States, 444 U. S. 164 (1979); United States v. Dickinson, 331 U. S. 745, 750 (1947); United States v. Causby, supra.

While the California Supreme Court may not have actually disavowed this general rule in Agins, we believe that it has truncated the rule by disallowing damages that occurred prior to the ultimate invalidation of the challenged regulation. The California Supreme Court justified its conclusion at length in the Agins opinion, concluding that:

“In combination, the need for preserving a degree of freedom in the land-use planning function, and the inhibiting financial force which inheres in the inverse condemnation remedy, persuade us that on balance mandamus or declaratory relief rather than inverse condemnation is the appropriate relief under the circumstances.” 24 Cal. 3d, at 276-277, 598 P. 2d, at 31.

We, of course, are not unmindful of these considerations, but they must be evaluated in the light of the command of the Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The Court has recognized in more than one case that the government may elect to abandon its intrusion or discontinue regulations. See, e. g., Kirby Forest Industries, Inc. v. United States, supra; United States v. Dow, 357 U. S. 17, 26 (1958). Similarly, a governmental body may acquiesce in a judicial declaration that one of its ordinances has effected an unconstitutional taking of property; the landowner has no right under the Just Compensation Clause to insist that a “temporary” taking be deemed a permanent taking. But we have not resolved whether abandonment by the government requires payment of compensation for the period of time during which regulations deny a landowner all use of his land.

In considering this question, we find substantial guidance in cases where the government has only temporarily exercised its right to use private property. In United States v. Dow, supra, at 26, though rejecting a claim that the Government may not abandon condemnation proceedings, the Court observed that abandonment “results in an alteration in the property interest taken — from [one of] full ownership to one of temporary use and occupation. ... In such cases compensation would be measured by the principles normally governing the taking of a right to use property temporarily. See Kimball Laundry Co. v. United States, 338 U. S. 1 [1949]; United States v. Petty Motor Co., 327 U. S. 372 [1946]; United States v. General Motors Corp., 323 U. S. 373 [1945].” Each of the cases cited by the Dow Court involved appropriation of private property by the United States for use during World War II. Though the takings were in fact “temporary,” see United States v. Petty Motor Co., 327 U. S. 372, 375 (1946), there was no question that compensation would be required for the Government’s interference with the use of the property; the Court was concerned in each case with determining the proper measure of the monetary relief to which the property holders were entitled. See Kimball Laundry Co. v. United States, 338 U. S. 1, 4-21 (1949); Petty Motor Co., supra, at 377-381; United States v. General Motors Corp., 323 U. S. 373, 379-384 (1945).

These cases reflect the fact that “temporary” takings which, as here, deny a landowner all use of his property, are not different in kind from permanent takings, for which the Constitution clearly requires compensation. Cf. San Diego Gas & Electric Co., 450 U. S., at 657 (Brennan, J., dissenting) (“Nothing in the Just Compensation Clause suggests that ‘takings’ must be permanent and irrevocable”). It is axiomatic that the Fifth Amendment’s just compensation provision is “designed to bar Government from forcing some people alone to bear public burdens which, in all fairness and justice, should be borne by the public as a whole.” Armstrong v. United States, 364 U. S., at 49. See also Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S. 104, 123-125 (1978); Monongahela Navigation Co. v. United States, 148 U. S., at 325. In the present case the interim ordinance was adopted by the County of Los Angeles in January 1979, and became effective immediately. Appellant filed suit within a month after the effective date of the ordinance and yet when the California Supreme Court denied a hearing in the case on October 17, 1985, the merits of appellant’s claim had yet to be determined. The United States has been required to pay compensation for leasehold interests of shorter duration than this. The value of a leasehold interest in property for a period of years may be substantial, and the burden on the property owner in extinguishing such an interest for a period of years may be great indeed. See, e. g., United States v. General Motors, supra. Where this burden results from governmental action that amounted to a taking, the Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment requires that the government pay the landowner for the value of the use of the land during this period. Cf. United States v. Causby, 328 U. S., at 261 (“It is the owner’s loss, not the taker’s gain, which is the measure of the value of the property taken”). Invalidation of the ordinance or its successor ordinance after this period of time, though converting the taking into a “temporary” one, is not a sufficient remedy to meet the demands of the Just Compensation Clause.

Appellee argues that requiring compensation for denial of all use of land prior to invalidation is inconsistent with this Court’s decisions in Danforth v. United States, 308 U. S. 271 (1939), and Agins v. Tiburon, 447 U. S. 255 (1980). In Danforth, the landowner contended that the “taking” of his property had occurred prior to the institution of condemnation proceedings, by reason of the enactment of the Flood Control Act itself. He claimed that the passage of that Act had diminished the value of his property because the plan embodied in the Act required condemnation of a flowage easement across his property. The Court held that in the context of condemnation proceedings a taking does not occur until compensation is determined and paid, and went on to say that “[a] reduction or increase in the value of property may occur by reason of legislation for or the beginning or completion of a project,” but “[s]uch changes in value are incidents of ownership. They cannot be considered as a ‘taking’ in the constitutional sense.” Danforth, supra, at 285. Agins likewise rejected a claim that the city’s preliminary activities constituted a taking, saying that “[m]ere fluctuations in value during the process of governmental decisionmaking, absent extraordinary delay, are ‘incidents of ownership.’” See 447 U. S., at 263, n. 9.

But these cases merely stand for the unexceptional proposition that the valuation of property which has been taken must be calculated as of the time of the taking, and that depreciation in value of the property by reason of preliminary activity is not chargeable to the government. Thus, in Agins, we concluded that the preliminary activity did not work a taking. It would require a considerable extension of these decisions to say that no compensable regulatory taking may occur until a challenged ordinance has ultimately been held invalid.¹⁰

Nothing we say today is intended to abrogate the principle that the decision to exercise the power of eminent domain is a legislative function “‘for Congress and Congress alone to determine.’ ” Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff, 467 U. S. 229, 240 (1984), quoting Berman v. Parker, 348 U. S. 26, 33 (1954). Once a court determines that a taking has occurred, the government retains the whole range of options already available — amendment of the regulation, withdrawal of the invalidated regulation, or exercise of eminent domain. Thus we do not, as the Solicitor General suggests, “permit a court, at the behest of a private person, to require the . . . Government to exercise the power of eminent domain . . . .” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 22. We merely hold that where the government’s activities have already worked a taking of all use of property, no subsequent action by the government can relieve it of the duty to provide compensation for the period during which the taking was effective.

We also point out that the allegation of the complaint which we treat as true for purposes of our decision was that the ordinance in question denied appellant all use of its property. We limit our holding to the facts presented, and of course do not deal with the quite different questions that would arise in the case of normal delays in obtaining building permits, changes in zoning ordinances, variances, and the like which are not before us. We realize that even our present holding will undoubtedly lessen to some extent the freedom and flexibility of land-use planners and governing bodies of municipal corporations when enacting land-use regulations. But such consequences necessarily flow from any decision upholding a claim of constitutional right; many of the provisions of the Constitution are designed to limit the flexibility and freedom of governmental authorities, and the Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment is one of them. As Justice Holmes aptly noted more than 50 years ago, “a strong public desire to improve the public condition is not enough to warrant achieving the desire by a shorter cut than the constitutional way of paying for the change.” Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U. S., at 416.

Here we must assume that the Los Angeles County ordinance has denied appellant all use of its property for a considerable period of years, and we hold that invalidation of the ordinance without payment of fair value for the use of the property during this period of time would be a constitutionally insufficient remedy. The judgment of the California Court of Appeal is therefore reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.

1 Section 835 of the California Government Code establishes conditions under which a public entity may be liable “for injury caused by a dangerous condition of its property. ...”

2 The trial court also granted defendants’ motion for judgment on the pleadings on the second cause of action, based on cloud seeding. It limited trial on the first cause of action for damages under Cal. Govt. Code Ann. § 835 (West 1980), rejecting the inverse condemnation claim. At the close of plaintiff’s evidence, the trial court granted a nonsuit on behalf of defendants, dismissing the entire complaint.

3 The California Court of Appeal also affirmed the lower court’s orders limiting the issues for trial on the first cause of action, granting a nonsuit on the issues that proceeded to trial, and dismissing the second cause of action — based on cloud seeding — to the extent it was founded on a theory of strict liability in tort. The court reversed the trial court’s ruling that the second cause of action could not be maintained against the Flood Control District under the theory of inverse condemnation. The case was remanded for further proceedings on this claim.

These circumstances alone, apart from the more particular issues presented in takings cases and discussed in the text, require us to consider whether the pending resolution of further liability questions deprives us of jurisdiction because we are not presented with a “final judgmen[t] or de-crete]” within the meaning of 28 U. S. C. § 1257. We think that this case is fairly characterized as one “in which the federal issue, finally decided by the highest court in the State [in which a decision could be had], will survive and require decision regardless of the outcome of future state-court proceedings.” Cox Broadcasting Corp. v. Cohn, 420 U. S. 469, 480 (1975). As we explain infra, at 311-313, the California Court of Appeal rejected appellant’s federal claim that it was entitled to just compensation from the county for the taking of its property; this distinct issue of federal law will survive and require decision no matter how further proceedings resolve the issues concerning the liability of the Flood Control District for its cloud seeding operation.

4 The Fifth Amendment provides “nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation,” and applies to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. See Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Chicago, 166 U. S. 226 (1897).

5 It has been urged that the California Supreme Court’s discussion of the compensation question in Agins v. Tiburon was dictum, because the court had already decided that the regulations could not work a taking. See Martino v. Santa Clara Valley Water District, 703 F. 2d 1141, 1147 (CA9 1983) (“extended dictum”). The Court of Appeal in this ease considered and rejected the possibility that the compensation discussion in Agins was dictum. See App. to Juris. Statement A14-A15, quoting Aptos Seascape Corp. v. County of Santa Cruz, 138 Cal. App. 3d 484, 493, 188 Cal. Rptr. 191, 195 (1982) (“[I]t is apparent that the Supreme Court itself did not intend its discussion [of inverse condemnation as a remedy for a taking] to be considered dictum . . . and it has not been treated as such in subsequent Court of Appeal cases”). Whether treating the claim as a takings claim is inconsistent with the first holding of Agins is not a matter for our concern. It is enough that the court did so for us to reach the remedial question.

6 Our eases have also required that one seeking compensation must “seek compensation through the procedures the State has provided for doing so” before the claim is ripe for review. Williamson County Regional Planning Comm’n v. Hamilton Bank, 473 U. S. 172, 194 (1985). It is clear that appellant met this requirement. Having assumed that a taking occurred, the California court’s dismissal of the action establishes that “the inverse condemnation procedure is unavailable . . . .” Id., at 197. The compensation claim is accordingly ripe for our consideration.

7 Because the issue was not raised in the complaint or considered relevant by the California courts in their assumption that a taking had occurred, we also do not consider the effect of the county’s permanent ordinance on the conclusions of the courts below. That ordinance, adopted in 1981 and reproduced at App. to Juris. Statement A32-A33, provides that “[a] person shall not use, erect, construct, move onto, or. . . alter, modify, enlarge or reconstruct any building or structure within the boundaries of a flood protection district except . . . [accessory buildings and structures that will not substantially impede the flow of water, including sewer, gas, electrical, and water 'systems, approved by the county engineer . . . ; [a]utomobile parking facilities incidental to a lawfully established use; [and] [f]lood-eontrol structures approved by the chief engineer of the Los Ange-les County Flood Control District.” County Code §22.44.220.

8 In addition to challenging the finality of the takings decision below, appellee raises two other challenges to our jurisdiction. First, going to both the appellate and certiorari jurisdiction of this Court under 28 U. S. C. § 1257, appellee alleges that appellant has failed to preserve for review any claim under federal law. Though the complaint in this case invoked only the California Constitution, appellant argued in the Court of Appeal that “recent Federal decisions . . . show the Federal Constitutional error in . . . Agins[ v. Tiburon, 24 Cal. 3d 266, 598 P. 2d 25 (1979)].” App. to Appellant’s Opposition to Appellee’s Second Motion to Dismiss A13. The Court of Appeal, by applying the state rule of Agins to dismiss appellant’s action, rejected on the merits the claim that the rule violated the United States Constitution. This disposition makes irrelevant for our purposes any deficiencies in the complaint as to federal issues. Where the state court has considered and decided the constitutional claim, we need not consider how or when the question was raised. Manhattan Life Ins. Co. v. Cohen, 234 U. S. 123, 134 (1914). Having succeeded in bringing the federal issue into the ease, appellant preserved this question on appeal to the California Supreme Court, see App. to Appellant’s Opposition to Ap-pellee’s Second Motion to Dismiss A14-A22, which declined to review its Agins decision. Accordingly, we find that the issue urged here was both raised and passed upon below.

Second, appellee challenges our appellate jurisdiction on the grounds that the ease below did not draw “in question the validity of a statute of any state ....’’ 28 U. S. C. § 1257(2). There is, of course, no doubt that the ordinance at issue in this case is “a statute of [a] state” for purposes of § 1257. See Erznoznik v. City of Jacksonville, 422 U. S. 205, 207, n. 3 (1975). As construed by the state courts, the complaint in this case alleged that the ordinance, by denying all use of the property, worked a taking without providing for just compensation. We have frequently treated such challenges to zoning ordinances as challenges to their validity under the Federal Constitution, and see no reason to revise that approach here. See, e. g., MacDonald, Sommer & Frates v. Yolo County, 477 U. S. 340 (1986); Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp., 458 U. S. 419 (1982); Agins v. Tiburon, 447 U. S. 255 (1980); Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S. 104 (1978). By holding that the failure to provide compensation was not unconstitutional, moreover, the California courts upheld the validity of the ordinance against the particular federal constitutional question at issue here — just compensation — and the case is therefore within the terms of § 1257(2).

9 The Solicitor General urges that the prohibitory nature of the Fifth Amendment, see supra, at 314, combined with principles of sovereign immunity, establishes that the Amendment itself is only a limitation on the power of the Government to act, not a remedial provision. The eases cited in the text, we think, refute the argument of the United States that “the Constitution does not, of its own force, furnish a basis for a court to award money damages against the government.” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 14. Though arising in various factual and jurisdictional settings, these cases make clear that it is the Constitution that dictates the remedy for interference with property rights amounting to a taking. See San Diego Gas & Electric Co. v. San Diego, 450 U. S. 621, 655, n. 21 (1981) (BRENNAN, J., dissenting), quoting United States v. Dickinson, 331 U. S. 745, 748 (1947).

10 Williamson County Regional Planning Comm’n, is not to the contrary. There, we noted that “no constitutional violation occurs until just compensation has been denied.” 473 U. S., at 194, n. 13. This statement, however, was addressed to the issue whether the constitutional claim was ripe for review and did not establish that compensation is unavailable for government activity occurring before compensation is actually denied. Though, as a matter of law, an illegitimate taking might not occur until the government refuses to pay, the interference that effects a taking might begin much earlier, and compensation is measured from that time. See Kirby Forest Industries, Inc. v. United States, 467 U. S. 1, 5 (1984) (Where Government physically occupies land without condemnation proceedings, “the owner has a right to bring an ‘inverse condemnation’ suit to recover the value of the land on the date of the intrusion by the Government”). (Emphasis added.)