Cite as: 526 U. S. 687 (1999)
Syllabus
inapposite by fundamental differences between a condemnation proceeding and a § 1983 action to redress an uncompensated taking. Most important, when the government initiates condemnation proceedings, it concedes the landowner's right to receive just compensation and seeks a mere determination of the amount of compensation due. Liability simply is not an issue. This difference renders the analogy not only unhelpful but inapposite. See, e. g., Bonaparte v. Camden & Amboy R. Co., 3 F. Cas. 821, 829 (No. 1,617) (CC NJ). Moreover, when the government condemns property for public use, it provides the landowner a forum for seeking just compensation as is required by the Constitution. See First English Evangelical Lutheran Church of Glendale v. County of Los Angeles, 482 U. S. 304, 316. If the condemnation proceedings do not, in fact, deny the landowner just compensation, the government's actions are neither unconstitutional nor unlawful. E. g., Williamson, supra, at 195. In this case, however, Del Monte Dunes was denied not only its property but also just compensation or even an adequate forum for seeking it. In these circumstances, the original understanding of the Takings Clause and historical practice support the conclusion that the cause of action sounds in tort and is most analogous to the various actions that lay at common law to recover damages for interference with property interests. In such common-law actions, there was a right to trial by jury. See, e. g., Feltner, supra, at 349. The city's argument, that because the Constitution allows the government to take property for public use, a taking for that purpose cannot be tortious or unlawful, is rejected. When the government repudiates its duty to provide just compensation, see, e. g., First English, supra, at 315, it violates the Constitution, and its actions are unlawful and tortious. Pp. 711-718.
Justice Scalia concluded: 1. The Seventh Amendment provides respondents with a right to a jury trial on their § 1983 claim. All § 1983 actions must be treated alike insofar as that right is concerned. Section 1983 establishes a unique, or at least distinctive, cause of action, in that the legal duty which is the basis for relief is ultimately defined not by the claim-creating statute itself, but by an extrinsic body of law to which the statute refers, namely, "federal rights elsewhere conferred." Baker v. McCollan, 443 U. S. 137, 144, n. 3. The question before the Court then is not what common-law action is most analogous to some generic suit seeking compensation for a Fifth Amendment taking, but what common-law action is most analogous to a § 1983 claim. This Court has concluded that all § 1983 claims should be characterized in the same way, Wilson v. Garcia, 471 U. S. 261, 271-272, as tort actions for the recovery of damages for personal injuries, id., at 276. Pp. 723-726.
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