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Page Number: 21

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

15 

Opinion of the Court 

1426 (5th ed. 1979) (“especially in the plural, [water] may 
designate  a  body  of  water,  such  as  a  river,  a  lake,  or  an 
ocean,  or  an  aggregate  of  such  bodies  of  water,  as  in  the
phrases ‘foreign waters,’ ‘waters of the United States,’ and 
the  like”  (emphasis  added));  Random  House  Dictionary  of 
the English Language 2146 (2d ed. 1987) (Random House
Dictionary) (defining “waters” as “a. flowing water, or water
moving in waves: The river’s mighty waters. b. the sea or 
seas bordering a particular country or continent or located
in a particular part of the world” (emphasis deleted)).  This 
meaning is hard to reconcile with classifying “ ‘ “lands,” wet 
or otherwise, as “waters.” ’ ”  Rapanos, 547 U. S., at 740 (plu-
rality  opinion)  (quoting  Riverside  Bayview,  474  U. S.,  at 
132).

This reading also helps to align the meaning of “the wa-
ters of the United States” with the term it is defining: “nav-
igable waters.”  See Bond v. United States, 572 U. S. 844, 
861 (2014) (“In settling on a fair reading of a statute, it is
not unusual to consider the ordinary meaning of a defined 
term,  particularly  when  there  is  dissonance  between  that 
ordinary  meaning  and  the  reach  of  the  definition”).    Alt-
hough  we  have  acknowledged  that  the  CWA  extends  to 
more than traditional navigable waters, we have refused to 
read “navigable” out of the statute, holding that it at least 
shows that Congress was focused on “its traditional juris-
diction over waters that were or had been navigable in fact
or  which  could  reasonably  be  so  made.”    SWANCC,  531 
U. S.,  at  172;  see  also  Appalachian  Electric,  311  U. S.,  at 
406–407; The Daniel Ball, 10 Wall., at 563.  At a minimum, 
then, the use of “navigable” signals that the definition prin-
cipally refers to bodies of navigable water like rivers, lakes, 
and oceans.  See Rapanos, 547 U. S., at 734 (plurality opin-
ion).

More  broadly,  this  reading  accords  with  how  Congress
has employed the term “waters” elsewhere in the CWA and