Note 1211 — Chapter II · : THE THEORY OF RENT AND ITS APPLICATIONS

Article 30 of the Act of September 16, 1807, runs as follows: “If as the result of the improvements already mentioned in this Act—through the making of new roads or the laying out of new squares, through the construction of quays or other public works—any private property acquires a notable increase in value, such property shall be made to pay an indemnity which may be equal to half the value of the advantage which has thus accrued to it.” The principle was rarely applied, however. M. Berthélemy (Traité élémentaire de Droit administratif, 1908, p. 624) states that he can only find twenty occasions on which the law was brought into operation in the whole course of the nineteenth century.