Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-454_4g15.pdf
Page Number: 72

Cite as:  598 U. S. ____ (2023) 

5 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring in judgment 

“to lie near, border on”; “not distant or far off ”; “nearby but 
not touching”).

By contrast to the Clean Water Act’s express inclusion of 
“adjacent”  wetlands,  other  provisions  of  the  Act  use  the 
narrower term “adjoining.”  Compare 33 U. S. C. §1344(g) 
with  §§1321(b)–(c)  (“adjoining  shorelines”  and  “adjoining 
shorelines  to  the  navigable  waters”);  §1346(c)  (“land 
adjoining  the  coastal  recreation  waters”);  see  also 
§1254(n)(4)  (“estuary”  includes  certain  bodies  of  water
“having  unimpaired  natural  connection  with  open  sea”);
§2802(5)  (“ ‘coastal  waters’ ”  includes  wetlands  “having
unimpaired connection with the open sea up to the head of 
tidal  influence”).  The  difference  in  those  two  terms  is 
critical to this case.  Two objects are “adjoining” if they “are 
so  joined  or  united  to  each  other  that  no  third  object 
intervenes.”  1968  Black’s  62  (comparing  “adjacent”  with
“adjoining”);  see  ibid.  (“Adjoining”  means  “touching  or
contiguous,  as  distinguished  from  lying  near  to  or 
adjacent”); see also Black’s Law Dictionary 38–39 (5th ed.
1979) (same); Webster’s Third 26–27 (similar).  As applied 
to wetlands, a marsh is adjacent to a river even if separated
by a levee, just as your neighbor’s house is adjacent to your
house even if separated by a fence or an alley.

In  other  contexts,  this  Court  has  recognized  the 
important difference in the meaning of the terms “adjacent”
and  “adjoining”  and  has  held  that  “adjacent”  is  broader 
than  “adjoining  or  actually  contiguous.”  United  States  v. 
St.  Anthony  R.  Co.,  192  U. S.  524,  533  (1904).    As  an 
example, the St. Anthony case concerned a federal statute 
granting railroads the right to cut timber from “public lands 
adjacent” to a railroad right of way.  Id., at 526, n. 1, 530. 
The Court held that timber could be taken from “adjacent” 
sections  of  land  that  were  not  “contiguous  to  or  actually
touching” the right of way.  Id., at 538.  The Court explained
that  if  “the  word  ‘adjoining’  had  been  used  instead  of 
‘adjacent,’ ”  a  railroad  could  not  have  taken  the  relevant