What do you do when a foreign for-profit company wants to run cheap, supposedly “green” electricity down through some of the most beautiful farm-and-forest countryside left in the Northeast — solely to make money in the lucrative southern New England market?

The project is the controversial Quebec Hydro transmission line, better known as Northern Pass. Push is coming to shove on the controversial issue of eminent domain, the question of whether and when the state should allow a utility to take property against the owner’s will. It is an issue that strikes directly at the heart of landowners’ rights, right up there with family legacy, tradition and religion.

In general, the credo has been that taking property is justified only for the greater common good — such as a highway or water supply. At issue is whether it should be allowed solely for private gain. The state Senate will debate a House bill on the issue this Wednesday at 10 a.m.

What do so many people seem not to know about Northern Pass?

-- That New Hampshire does not need the power. It produces far more power than it needs, and exports the rest.

-- That the huge transmission line, with towers up to 135 feet, will not solely use existing rights of way. In fact, 40 miles of entirely new right of way will be hacked and cleared across some of the most beautiful pastoral and forest lands in New England, from the Canadian border down through Pittsburg, Clarksville, Stewartstown, Colebrook, Columbia and Stratford. This is a region inhabited by people with a fierce love of the land and its way of life and visited by millions of people who go there for the scenery and recreation — just about all that local people scratching for a living have left.

-- Tax windfalls for the towns along the route? The counter-argument is that (a) the taxes will fall steadily due to depreciation and (b) decreased value of properties alongside or overlooking the power line will far outweigh any tax benefit.

Jobs? They’re flash-in-the pan jobs to begin with. And the high-paying jobs will go, quite rightly, to people who are expert at erecting huge power lines. We’ll get the short-lived, low-paying jobs — waving traffic flags and flipping burgers and bedsheets.

-- And “green” hydro power from Quebec? Give us a break. Flooding millions, if not billions, of shrubs and trees that sequester carbon and give off oxygen? Duh.

The government-subsidized, public-private Northern Pass project is all about greed, not need. Quebec simply needs a market for its cheap power. There should be no eminent domain, ever, for private gain. Absent some compelling need for the greater common good, taking people’s property is just plain wrong. It is the ultimate infringement on landowner and individual rights.

Let’s hope citizens continue to focus on this underlying issue, and that the Senate, the House and the governor will strain their ears to listen.

John Harrigan’s column appears weekly in the New Hampshire Sunday News. His address is Box 39, Colebrook 03576. Email him at hooligan@ncia.net.