554
Breyer, J., dissenting
after they retired. And Eastern, until 1987, continued to draw sizable profits from the coal industry through a wholly owned subsidiary. For these reasons, I believe that Congress did not act unreasonably or otherwise unjustly in imposing these health care costs upon Eastern. Consequently, in my view, the statute before us is constitutional.
I
As a preliminary matter, I agree with Justice Kennedy, ante, at 539-547 (opinion concurring in judgment and dissenting in part), that the plurality views this case through the wrong legal lens. The Constitution's Takings Clause does not apply. That Clause refers to the taking of "private property . . . for public use, without just compensation." U. S. Const., Amdt. 5. As this language suggests, at the heart of the Clause lies a concern, not with preventing arbitrary or unfair government action, but with providing compensation for legitimate government action that takes "private property" to serve the "public" good.
The "private property" upon which the Clause traditionally has focused is a specific interest in physical or intellectual property. See, e. g., Penn Central Transp. Co. v. New York City, 438 U. S. 104, 124 (1978); Ruckelshaus v. Monsanto Co., 467 U. S. 986 (1984). It requires compensation when the government takes that property for a public purpose. See Dolan v. City of Tigard, 512 U. S. 374, 384 (1994) (Clause requires payment so that government cannot " 'forc[e] some people alone to bear public burdens which, in all fairness and justice, should be borne by the public as a whole' " (quoting Armstrong v. United States, 364 U. S. 40, 49 (1960))). This case involves not an interest in physical or intellectual property, but an ordinary liability to pay money, and not to the Government, but to third parties.
This Court has not directly held that the Takings Clause applies to the creation of this kind of liability. The Court has made clear that not only seizures through eminent do-
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