Opinion ID: 355551
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Interstate Boundaries.

Text: 19 In Oregon ex rel. State Land Board v. Corvallis Sand & Gravel Co., 429 U.S. 363, 97 S.Ct. 582, 50 L.Ed.2d 550 (1977), the Supreme Court reaffirmed the basic rule that the laws of the several states determine the ownership of the banks and shores of waterways. Id. at 378-79, 97 S.Ct. 582. However, the Court recognized an important caveat to this rule: 20 If a navigable stream is an interstate boundary, this Court, in the exercise of its original jurisdiction over suits between States, has necessarily developed a body of federal common law to determine the effect of a change in the bed of the stream on the boundary. Id. at 375, 97 S.Ct. at 589. 11 21 As the Supreme Court noted in Arkansas v. Tennessee, 246 U.S. 158, 176, 38 S.Ct. 301, 306, 62 L.Ed. 638 (1918): 22 (T)hese dispositions are in each case limited by the interstate boundary, and cannot be permitted to press back the boundary line from where otherwise it should be located. 23 Cf. St. Louis v. Rutz, 138 U.S. 226, 250, 11 S.Ct. 337, 34 L.Ed. 941 (1891). 24 Federal common law is applicable even where only a single state is involved in a controversy with a private party, see Cissna v. Tennessee, 246 U.S. 289, 38 S.Ct. 306, 62 L.Ed. 720 (1918), or where only private parties are involved, see Hinderlider v. La Plata River & Cherry Creek Ditch Co., 304 U.S. 92, 58 S.Ct. 803, 82 L.Ed. 1202 (1938); Committee for Consideration of Jones Falls Sewage System v. Train, 539 F.2d 1006, 1009 n. 8 (4th Cir. 1976); Port of Portland v. An Island In Columbia River, 479 F.2d 549 (9th Cir. 1973); Sherrill v. McShan, 356 F.2d 607 (9th Cir. 1966); Iselin v. La Coste, 139 F.2d 887 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 321 U.S. 790, 64 S.Ct. 791, 88 L.Ed. 1080 (1944), as long as the interests of more than one state are sufficiently implicated in the potential outcome. The rendering of a decision in a private dispute which would press back an interstate boundary sufficiently implicates the interests of the states to require the application of federal common law. 25 In this case any claim that the reservation's eastern boundary had changed would of necessity have concerned the interstate boundary between Iowa and Nebraska, at least until 1943, thereby invoking federal law since both boundaries were located at the thalweg of the Missouri River. However, in 1943 Iowa and Nebraska entered into a compact under which the boundary between the states was permanently established at the middle of the main channel of the Missouri River in essentially its position in 1943. Iowa-Nebraska Boundary Compact, Iowa Code 1971, p. lxiv; 1943 Iowa Acts ch. 306; 1943 Nebraska Laws ch. 130. Ratified by Congress in Act of July 12, 1943, 57 Stat. 494 (1943). 12 To apply the compact it is nevertheless necessary to establish title good in one state or the other as of 1943. Iowa-Nebraska Boundary Compact § 3. Good title in a state prior to 1943 in turn depends upon the location of the thalweg of the Missouri River, a determination which would have been controlled by federal law. Thus, in this case, since the issue concerns who held good title to the land in question prior to 1943, federal law must be applied. 26