Source: https://openjurist.org/332/us/19
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 01:58:23+00:00

Document:
Argued March 13, 14, 1947.
We may assume that location of the exact coastal line will involve many complexities and difficulties. But that does not make this any the less a justiciable controversy. Certainly demarcation of the boundary is not an impossibility. Despite difficulties this Court has previously adjudicated controversies concerning submerged land boundaries. See State of New Jersey v. State of Delaware, 291 U.S. 361, 54 S.Ct. 407, 78 L.Ed. 847, Id., 295 U.S. 694, 55 S.Ct. 907, 79 L.Ed. 1659; Borax Consolidated, Ltd. v. City of Los Angeles, 296 U.S. 10, 21—27, 56 S.Ct. 23, 28—31, 80 L.Ed. 9; State of Oklahoma v. State of Texas, 256 U.S. 70, 41 S.Ct. 420, 6 5 L.Ed. 831, Id., 256 U.S. 602, 41 S.Ct. 539, 65 L.Ed. 1115. And there is no reason why, after determining in general who owns the three-mile belt here involved, the Court might not later, if necessary, have more detailed hearings in order to determine with greater definiteness particular segments of the boundary. State of Oklahoma v. State of Texas, 258 U.S. 574, 582, 42 S.Ct. 406, 410, 66 L.Ed. 771. Such practice is commonplace in actions similar to this which are in the nature of equitable proceedings. See e.g. State of Oklahoma v. State of Texas, 256 U.S. at pages 608, 609, 41 S.Ct. at page 540, 541, 65 L.Ed. 1115, Id., 260 U.S. 606, 625, 43 S.Ct. 221, 222, 67 L.Ed. 428; Id., 261 U.S. 340, 43 S.Ct. 376, 67 L.Ed. 687. California's contention concerning the indefinitieness of the claim presents no insuperable obstacle to the exercise of the highly important jurisdiction conferred on us by Article III of the Constitution.
Second. It is contended that we should dismiss this action on the ground that the Attorney General has not been granted power either to file or to maintain it. It is not denied that Congress has given a very broad authority to the Attorney General to institute and conduct litigation in order to establish and safeguard government rights and properties.3 The argument is that Congress has for a long period of years acted in such a way as to manifest a clear policy to the effect that the states, not the Federal Government, have legal title to the land under the three-mile belt. Although Congress has not expressly declared such a policy, we are asked to imply it from certain conduct of Congress and other governmental agencies charged with responsibilities concerning the national domain. And, in effect, we are urged to infer that Congress has by implication amended its long-existing statutes which grant the Attorney General broad powers to institute and maintain court proceedings in order to safeguard national interests.
But no Act of Congress has amended the statutes which impose on the Attorney General the authority and the duty to protect the Government's interests through the courts. See Ex parte Cooper, 143 U.S. 472, 502, 503, 12 S.Ct. 453, 460, 461, 36 L.Ed. 232. That Congress twice failed to grant the Attorney General specific authority to file suit against California,4 is not a sufficient basis upon which to rest a restriction of the Attorney General's statutory authority. And no more can we reach such a conclusion because both Houses of Congress passed a joint resolution quitclaiming to the adjacent states a three mile belt of all land situated under the ocean beyond the low water mark, exept those which the Government had previously acquired by purchase, condemnation, or donation.5 This joint resolution was vetoed by the President.6 His veto was sustained.7 Plainly, the resolution does not represent an exercise of the constitutional power of Congress to dispose of public property under Article IIv, § 3, Cl. 2.
Third. The crucial question on the merits is not merely who owns the bare legal title to the lands under the marginal sea. The United States here asserts rights in two capacities transcending those of a mere property owner. In one capacity it asserts the right and responsibility to exercise whatever power and dominion are necessary to protect this country against dangers to the security and tranquility of its people incident to the fact that the United States is located immediately adjacent to the ocean. The Government also appears in its capacity as a member of the family of nations. In that capacity it is responsible for conducting United States relations with other nations. It asserts that proper exercise of these constitutional responsibilities requires that it have power, unencumbered by state commitments, always to determine what agreements will be made concerning the control and use of the marginal sea and the land under it. See McCulloch v. State of Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 403—408, 17 U.S. 316, 403—408, 4 L.Ed. 579; United States v. State of Minnesota, 270 U.S. 181, 194, 46 S.Ct. 298, 300, 301, 70 L.Ed. 539. In the light of the foregoing, our question is whether the state or the Federal Government has the paramount right and power to determine in the first instance when, how, and by what agencies, foreign or domestic, the oil and other resources of the soil of the marginal sea, known or hereafter discovered may be exploited.
The Government does not deny that under the Pollard rule, as explained in later cases,8 California has a qualified ownership9 of lands under inland navigable waters such as rivers, harbors, and even tidelands down to the low water mark. It does question the validity of the rationale in the Pollard case that ownership of such water areas, any more than ownership of uplands, is a necessary incident of the state sovereignty contemplated by the 'equal footing' clause. Cf. United States v. State of Oregon, 295 U.S. 1, 14, 55 S.Ct. 610, 615, 79 L.Ed. 1267. For this reason, among others, it argues that the Pollard rule should not be extended so as to apply to lands under the ocean. It stresses that the thirteen original colonies did not own the marginal belt; that the Federal Government did not seriously assert its increasingly greater rights in this area until after the formation of the Union; that it has not bestowed any of these rights upon the states, but has retained them as appurtenances of national sovereignty. And the Government insists that no previous case in this Court has involved or decided conflicting claims of a state and the Federal Government to the three-mile belt in a way which requires our extension of the Pollard inland water rule to the ocean area.
It would unduly prolong our opinion to discuss in detail the multitude of references to which the able briefs of the parties have cited us with reference to the evolution of powers over marginal seas exercised by adjacent countries. From all the wealth of material supplied, however, we cannot say that the thirteen original colonies separately acquired ownership to the three-mile belt or the soil under it,10 even if they did acquire elements of the sovereignty of the English Crown by their revolution against it. Cf. United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corporation, 299 U.S. 304, 316, 57 S.Ct. 216, 219, 81 L.Ed. 255.
At the time this country won its independence from England there was no settled international custom or understanding among nations that each nation owned a three-mile water belt along its borders. Some countries, notably England, Spain, and Portugal, had, from time to time, made sweeping claims to a right of dominion over wide expanses of ocean. And controversies had arisen among nations about rights to fish in prescribed areas.11 But when this nation was formed, the idea of a three-mile belt over which a littoral nation could exercise rights of ownership was but a nebulous suggestion.12 Neither the English charters granted to this nation's settlers,13 nor the treaty of peace with England,14 nor any other document to which we have been referred, showed a purpose to set apart a three-mile ocean belt for colonial or state ownership.15 Those who settled this country were interested in lands upon which to live, and waters upon which to fish and sail. There is no substantial support in history for the idea that they wanted or claimed a right to block off the ocean's bottom for private ownership and use in the extraction of its wealth.
It did happen that shortly after we became a nation our statesmen became interested in establishing national dominion over a definite marginal zone to protect our neutrality.16 Largely as a result of their efforts, the idea of a definite three-mile belt in which an adjacent nation can, if it chooses, exercise broad, if not complete dominion, has apparently at last been generally accepted throughout the world,17 although as late as 1876 there was still considerable doubt in England about its scope and even its existence. See The Queen v. Keyn, L.R. 2 Exch.Div. 63. That the political agencies of this nation both claim and exercise broad dominion and control over our three-mile marginal belt is now a settled fact. Cunard Steamship Co. v. Mellon, 262 U.S. 100, 122—124, 43 S.Ct. 504, 506—508, 67 L.Ed. 894, 27 A.L.R. 1306.18 And this assertion of national dominion over the three-mile belt is binding upon this Court. See Jones v. United States, 137 U.S. 202, 212—214, 11 S.Ct. 80, 83, 84, 34 L.Ed. 691; Ex parte Cooper, 143 U.S. 472, 502, 503, 12 S.Ct. 453, 460, 461, 36 L.Ed. 232.
Not only has acquisition, as it were, of the three-mile belt, been accomplished by the national Government, but protection and control of it has ben and is a function of national external sovereignty. See Jones v. United States, 137 U.S. 202, 11 S.Ct. 80, 34 L.Ed. 691; Ex parte Cooper, 143 U.S. 472, 502, 12 S.Ct. 453, 460, 36 L.Ed. 232. The belief that local interests are so predominant as constitutionally to require state dominion over lands under its land-locked navigable waters finds some argument for its support. But such can hardly be said in favor of state control over any part of the ocean or the ocean's bottom. This country, throughout its existence has stood for freedom of the seas, a principle whose breach has precipitated wars among nations. The country's adoption of the three-mile belt is by no means incompatible with its traditional insistence upon freedom of the sea, at least so long as the national Government's power to exercise control consistently with whatever international undertakings or commitments it may see fit to assume in the national interest is unencumbered. See Hines v. Davidowitz, 312 U.S. 52, 62—64, 61 S.Ct. 399, 401—403, 85 L.Ed. 581; McCulloch v. State of Maryland, supra. The three-mile rule is but a recognition of the necessity that a government next to the sea must be able to protect itself from dangers incident to its location. It must have powers of dominion and regulation in the interest of its revenues, its health, and the security of its people from was waged on or too near its coasts. And insofar as the nation asserts its rights under international law, whatever of value may be discovered in the seas next to its shores and within its protective belt, will most naturally be appropriated for its use. But whatever any nation does in the open sea, which detracts from its common usefulness to nations, or which another nation may charge detracts from it,19 is a question for consideration among nations as such, and not their separate governmental units. What this Government does, or even what the states do, anywhere in the ocean, is a subject upon which the nation may enter into and assume treaty or similar international obligations. See United States v. Belmont, 301 U.S. 324, 331, 332, 57 S.Ct. 758, 761, 762, 81 L.Ed. 1134. The very oil about which the state and nation here contend might well become the subject of international dispute and settlement.
The ocean, even its three-mile belt, is thus of vital consequence to the nation in its desire to engage in commerce and to live in peace with the world; it also becomes of crucial importance should it ever again become impossible to preserve that peace. And as peace and world commerce are the paramount responsibilities of the nation, rather than an individual state, so, if wars come, they must be fought by the nation. See Chy Lung v. Freeman, 92 U.S. 275, 279, 23 L.Ed. 550. The state is not equipped in our constitutional system with the powers or the facilities for exercising the responsibilities which would be concomitant with the dominion which it seeks. Conceding that the state has been authorized to exercise local police power functions in the part of the marginal belt within its declared boundaries,20 these do not detract from the Federal Government's paramount rights in and power over this area. Consequently, we are not persuaded to transplant the Pollard rule of ownership as an incident of state sovereignty in relation to inland waters out into the soil beneath the ocean, so much more a matter of national concern. If this rationale of the Pollard case is a valid basis for a conclusion that paramount rights run to the states in inland waters to the shoreward of the low water mark, the same rationale leads to the conclusion that national interests responsibilities, and therefore national rights are paramount in waters lying to the seaward in the three-mile belt. Cf. United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corporation, 299 U.S. 304, 316, 57 S.Ct. 216, 219, 81 L.Ed. 255; United States v. Causby, 328 U.S. 256, 66 S.Ct. 1062, 90 L.Ed. 1206.
None of the foregoing cases, nor others which we have decided, are sufficient to require us to extend the Pollard inland water rule so as to declare that California owns or has paramount rights in or power over the three-mile belt under the ocean. The question of who owned the bed of the sea only became of great potential importance at the beginning of this century when oil was discovered there.21 As a consequence of this discovery, California passed an Act in 1921 authorizing the granting of permits to California residents to prospect for oil and gas on blocks of land off its coast under the ocean. Cal.Stats.1921, c. 303, p. 404. This state statute, and others which followed it, together with the leasing practices under them, have precipitated this extremely important controversy, and pointedly raised this state-federal conflict for the first time. Now that the question is here, we decide for the reasons we have stated that California is not the owner of the three-mile marginal belt along its coast, and that the Federal Government rather than the state has paramount rights in and power over that belt, an incident to which is full dominion over the resources of the soil under that water area, including oil.
To speak of 'dominion' carries precisely those overtones in the law which relate to property and not to political authority. Dominion, from the Roman concept dominium, was concerned with property and ownership, as against imperium, which related to political sovereignty. One may choose to say, for example, that the United States has 'national dominion' over navigable streams. But the power to regulate commerce over these streams, and its continued exercise, do not change the imperium of the United States into dominium over the land below the waters. Of course the United States has 'paramount rights' in the sea belt of California—the rights that are implied by the power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce, the power of condemnation, the treaty-making power, the war power. We have not now before us the validity of the exercise of any of these paramount rights. Rights of ownership are here asserted—and rights of ownership are something else. Ownership implies acquisition in the various ways in which land is acquired by conquest, by discovery and claim, by cession, by prescription, by purchase, by condemnation. When and how did the United States acquire this land?
5 U.S.C. §§ 291, 309, 5 U.S.C.A. §§ 291, 309; United States v. San Jacinto Tin Co., 125 U.S. 273, 279, 284, 8 S.Ct. 850, 854, 856, 31 L.Ed. 747; Kern River Co. v. United States, 257 U.S. 147, 154, 155, 42 S.Ct. 60, 62, 63, 66 L.Ed. 175; Sanitary District of Chicago v. United States, 266 U.S. 405, 425, 426, 45 S.Ct. 176, 178, 179, 69 L.Ed. 352; see also In re Debs, 158 U.S. 564, 584, 15 S.Ct. 900, 906, 39 L.Ed. 1092; United States v. State of Oregon, 295 U.S. 1, 24, 55 S.Ct. 610, 619, 79 L.Ed. 1267; United States v. State of Wyoming, 323 U.S. 669, 65 S.Ct. 34, 89 L.Ed. 543; 331 U.S. 440, 67 S.Ct. 1319.
S.J.Res.208, 75th Cong., 1st Sess. (1938); S.J.Res.83 and 92, 76th Cong., 1st Sess. (1939). S.J.Res.208 passed the Senate, 81 Cong.Rec.9326 (1938), was favorably reported by the House Judiciary Committee, H.R.Rep.2378, 75th Cong., 3d Sess. (1938), but was never acted on in the House. Hearings were held on S.J.Res.83 and 92 before the Senate Committee on Public Lands and Surveys, but no further action was taken. Hearings before the Senate Committee on Public Lands and Serveys an S.J.Res.83 and 92, 76th Cong., 1st Sess. (1939). In both hearings objections to the resolutions were repeatedly made on the ground that passage of the resolutions was unnecessary since the Attorney General already had statutory authority to institute the proceedings. See Hearings before the House Committee on the Judiciary on S.J.Res.208, 75th Cong., 3d Sess., 42—45, 59—61 (1938); Hearings on S.J.Res.83 and 92, supra, 27—30.
See, e.g., Fulton, op. cit. supra, 3—19, 144, 145; Jessup, op. cit. supra, 4.
Secretary of State Jefferson in a note to the British minister in 1793 pointed to the nebulous character of a nation's assertions of territorial rights in the marginal belt, and put forward the first official American claim for a three-mile zone which has since won general international acceptance.Reprinted in H.Ex.Doc.No. 324, 42d Cong., 2d Sess. (1872) 553—554. See also Secretary Jefferson's note to the French Minister, Genet, reprinted American State Papers, I Foreign Relations (1833), 183, 384; Act of June 5, 1794, 1 Stat. 381; 1 Kent, Commentaries, 14th Ed., 33—40.

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