Drafted at the Philadelphia Convention in 1787 and ratified in 1788, the United States Constitution created a federal republic with powers divided between national and state governments and among legislative, executive and judicial branches. It reserved most authority over land use, property and local government to the states, who in turn delegated it to municipalities, establishing the legal foundation for American zoning and planning. Its Fifth Amendment requires just compensation when private property is taken for public use, the basis of eminent-domain and regulatory-takings doctrine. The structure it set produced a highly decentralised system of urban governance.
It fixed the federal division of powers that makes land-use control a state and local matter in the United States, and its takings clause defines the constitutional limit of public planning power.