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Page Number: 46

12 

SACKETT v. EPA 

THOMAS, J., concurring 

of  small  streams  not  used  habitually  as  arteries  of  inter-
state  commerce.”  177  U.  S.,  at  632.    The  Court  observed 
that  applying  the  Act  to  wetlands  reclamation  “would  ex-
tend the paramount jurisdiction of the United States over
all the flowing waters in the States.”  Id., at 633.  “If such 
were the necessary construction of the” term “navigable wa-
ter,” the Court explained, the River and Harbor Act’s “va-
lidity might well be questioned.”  Ibid.  But, the Court de-
clined to interpret the Act to reach the wetlands, because it
recognized that the phrase “navigable waters of the United
States” encompassed only those waters reached by the tra-
ditional channels-of-commerce authority: 

“When it is remembered that the source of the power of 
the  general  government  to  act  at  all  in  this  matter 
arises out of its power to regulate commerce with for-
eign countries and among the States, it is obvious that 
what the Constitution and the acts of Congress have in 
view is the promotion and protection of commerce in its
international  and  interstate  aspect,  and  a  practical
construction  must  be  put  on  these  enactments  as  in-
tended for such large and important purposes.”  Ibid. 

The Court thus held that the mere use of a wetland by fish-
ermen was not sufficient to make the wetland a navigable
water of the United States; it “was not shown that passen-
gers were ever carried through it, or that freight destined 
to any other State than Louisiana, or, indeed, destined for 
any market in Louisiana, was ever, much less habitually,
carried through it.”  Id., at 627.4 

—————— 

4 Leovy v. United States also reflected the law’s longstanding hostility 
to wetlands: “If there is any fact which may be supposed to be known by
everybody, and, therefore, by courts, it is that swamps and stagnant wa-
ters are the cause of malarial and malignant fevers, and that the police 
power is never more legitimately exercised than in removing such nui-
sances.”  177 U. S., at 636.  Traditionally, the only time wetlands were
the subject of federal legislation was to aid the States in draining them.