Source: https://collections.lib.utah.edu/details?id=1138407
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 08:35:48+00:00

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25 tect the various arteries of interstate commerce from the disasters of floods. By the same tokens, it is for Congress to decide whether a proj- ect's benefits to commerce outweigh the costs of the under- taking.90 Effect of Exercise of Commerce Power Upon Nonfederal Interests.-Next, it is important to note the effect of the exercise of commerce authority in relation to state and private interests. As already indicated, a riparian owner may under state law hold title, as between himself and others than the Gov- ernment, to a part of a navigable stream's bed, since the people became sovereign following the American Revolution and thus held absolute right to navigable waters and the beds under them, subject to those rights granted to the Federal Gov- ernment in the Constitution.91 From this latter paramount qualification evolved the general rule that the Government does x^t have to compensate for destruction of private interests over which, at the point of conflict, it has a superior navigation ease- ment under the Commerce Clause, the exercise of which occa- sions the damage.92 The dominant federal right to improve navigable waters in the interests of navigation "extends to the entire bed of a stream, which includes the lands below ordinary high-water mark. The exercise of the power within these limits is not an invasion of any private property right in such lands for which the United States must make compensation."93 Thus, destruc- tion of a riparian owner's landing by a navigation improvement inflicts a damage merely incidental to exercise of the dominant servitude and involves no taking of private property for public 80 313 TL S. at 528. M See supra, p. 12. 82 United States v. Chandler-Dunbar Co., 229 U. S. 53 (1913); United States v. Appalachian Electric Power Co., 311 U. S. 377 (1940), reh. den., 312 U. S. 712 (1941); United States v. Commodore Park, Inc., 324 U. S. 386 (1945) ; United States v. Willow River Power Co., 324 U. S. 499 (1945). See also Arizona v. California, 298 U. S. 558, 569 (1936). 88 United States v. Chicago, M., St. P. & P. R. Co., 312 U. S. 592, 597 (1941). See also Lewis Blue Point Oyster Co. v. Briggs, 229 U. S. 82, 88 (1913) ; Qreenleaf Johnson Lumber Go. v. Garrison, 237 U. S. 251, 263 (1915) ; Willink v. United States, 240 U. S. 572, 580 (1916).

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