Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/197/510/
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 02:10:53+00:00

Document:
The question of the title of a riparian owner is one of local law, and unrestricted grants of the government, bounded on streams and other waters, are to be construed according to the law of the state in which the lands lie. Hardin v. Jordan, 140 U. S. 371.
See also Shively v. Bowlby, 152 U. S. 45; Lowndes v. Huntington, 153 U. S. 19; Grand Rapids &c. Railroad Company v. Butler, 159 U. S. 87, 159 U. S. 92; St. Anthony Falls Power Company v. Water Commissioners, 168 U. S. 349; Kean v. Calumet Canal Co., 190 U. S. 452; Hardin v. Shedd, 190 U. S. 508.
It must also be noticed that the government is not a party to this litigation, and nothing we have said is to be construed as a determination of the power of the government to order a survey of this island, or of the rights which would result in case it did make such survey. As we reserve the rights of the United States, we do not even impliedly sanction the intimation contained in the opinion of the court below that, under the decision in Hardin v. Jordan, 140 U. S. 371, although, on nonnavigable waters, riparian rights were not conferred by the state law, nevertheless the land beyond the banks passed to the state in virtue of the patents of the United States to the lot owners. Upon that question we express no opinion.

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