Arthur Manigault v. Alfred Springs

Decision Date04 December 1905
Docket NumberNo. 46,46
Citation199 U.S. 473,26 S.Ct. 127,50 L.Ed. 274
PartiesARTHUR M. MANIGAULT, Appt. , v. ALFRED A. SPRINGS et al
CourtU.S. Supreme Court

This was a bill in equity filed March 4, 1903, by Manigault to enjoin the damming or otherwise obstructing Kinloch creek, in the county of Georgetown, South Carolina. A demurrer to the bill was sustained, and the bill subsequently dismissed. See 123 Fed. 707.

It seems that, in 1898, the plaintiff and the two defendants, Springs and Lachicotte, together with one Ford, were adjoining riparian owners on the Santee river, at the mouth of Kinloch creek. The creek furnished access as a highway to all the proprietors on its banks. At that time the defendants constructed a dam across the creek for their own purposes. Objection was made to this by plaintiff and by Ford as an interference with their rights of passage and irrigation. Plaintiff also complained that the effect was to compel him to raise the dikes around his lands. As a result of long negotiations, a compromise was effected and a contract entered into in August, 1898, between defendants under the name of S. M. Ward & Company, of the first part, and plaintiff and Ford, of the second part, whereby it was agreed that the obstructions should continue until December 31 of that year, when they should be removed, so as to give the parties complaining a clear passage through the creek.

This removal was effected and matters allowed to remain as they were until 1903, when the general assembly of the state passed an act reciting the necessity of draining the lowlands on the Santee river, whereby their taxable value would be greatly enhanced. Authority was given to the defendants by name to erect and maintain a dam across Kinloch creek, with a proviso that they should be liable for all such damages as might be established in any court of competent jurisdiction by any landowner claiming that his land had been damaged by reason of the erection of the dam.

Mr. Henry A. M. Smith for appellant.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 474-477 intentionally omitted] Mr. Theodore G. Barker for appellees.

Statement by Mr. Justice Brown:

Mr. Justice Brown delivered the opinion of the court:

The gravamen of the bill is the alleged impairment by the statute of 1903 of the contract entered into in 1898, by which defendants agreed to remove the dam then existing, and to allow such creek to remain open and unobstructed.

It was also charged that the Constitution of South Carolina, declared hat all navigable waters should forever remain public highways, was a privilege annexed to and constituting a part of the value of the lands, and that the damming of the creek, except for the purpose of the public health, welfare, and safety, and without due compensation therefor, was a destruction of the property of the plaintiff, and a deprivation thereof without due process of law.

The specific injury complained of is that the plaintiff is the owner of a rice plantation on the North Santee river, bordering on Minim creek, a tributary of the Santee, and lying in part just opposite the mouth or entrance of Kinloch creek; that, relying on the agreement of the defendants, he had also purchased a millsite on the Santee, which could be used for a rice mill or a sawmill, the chief element of value of which was the water connection by means of a canal with Bluff Back creek, accessible only through Kinloch creek, and the consequent necessity of keeping Kinloch creek open and unobstructed; that Kinloch creek is a water highway, navigable by vessels into the Santee river and thence into the ocean; that the erection and retention of a dam across Kinloch creek would not only interrupt his use of Kinloch creek and Bluff Back creek by preventing access to the public landing on the state road from his plantation on Kinloch creek, but would obstruct the inflow of the tide of the Santee river through Minim creek, causing the water from the river to flow back upon the banks to the plantation opposite the mouth of Kinloch creek, and would thus compel him to raise and strengthen his banks.

1. The first question considered by the court below was whether Kinloch creek was a navigable water of the United States, as defined in the case of The Montello (United States v. The Montello) 11 Wall. 411, 20 L. ed. 191, 20 Wall. 430, 22 L. ed. 391, or navigable, as navigable streams are defined by the Constitution and the laws of South Carolina. The court was of opinion, based apparently upon affidavits not sent up with the record, that the creek was not a navigable stream under these definitions.

But the bill alleges that 'Kinloch creek is a navigable stream or water highway,' and the cause was determined upon demurrer to the bill, which admits the allegation of the bill that the creek was navigable. As an original proposition we have repeatedly held that, in the absence of legislation by Congress, as state has power to improve its lands and promote the general health by authorizing a dam to be built across its interior streams, though they were previously navigable to the sea by vessels engaged in the coastwise trade. This was decided in Willson v. Black Bird Creek Marsh Co. 2 Pet. 245, 7 L. ed. 412, in a brief but cogent opinion by Mr. Chief Justice Marshall. An act of the state of Delaware gave the defendant the right to build a dam across the Black Bird Marsh creek, the constitutionality of which act was attacked as an abridgment of the rights of those who had been accustomed to use it for the purposes of navigation. 'But this abridgment,' said the court (p. 251, L. ed. p. 414), 'unless it comes in conflict with the Constitution or a law of the United States, is an affair between the government of Delaware and its citizens, of which this court can take no cognizance.' The act was sustained. See also Pound v. Turck, 95 U. S. 459, 24, L. ed. 525; Gilman v. Philadelphia, 3 Wall. 732, 18 L. ed. 101; Huse v. Glover, 119 U. S. 543, 30 L. ed. 487, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 313.

We do not think the provision of the Constitution of South Carolina interferes with these common-law powers of the state over its navigable waters. In Escanaba & L. M. Transp. Co. v. Chicago, 107 U. S. 678, 688, 27 L. ed. 442, 446, 2 Sup. Ct. Rep. 185, it was held that the right of bridging NAVIGA- BLE STREAMS EXTENDED TO THE STATE Of illinois, notwithstanding that the ordinance of 1787, for the government of the Northwest territory, contained a clause declaring that 'the navigable waters leading into the Mississippi and St. Lawrence, and the carrying places between them, shall be common highways and forever free.' The power to span these rivers by bridges was put partly upon the theory that the limitations upon the power of the state whilst in a territorial condition ceased to have any operative force except as voluntarily adopted by her after she became a state of the Union, and partly upon the theory, as said Mr. Justice Field, page 689, L. ed. p. 447, Sup. Ct. Rep. p. 194, that 'all highways, whether by land or water, are subject to such crossings as the public necessities and convenience may require, and their character as such is not changed if the crossings are allowed under reasonable conditions, and not so as to needlessly obstruct the use of the highways.'

So also in Cardwell v. American River Bridge Co. 113 U. S. 205, 28 L. ed. 959, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 423, a provision in the act admitting California [9 Stat. at L. 453, chap. 50, § 3], that 'all the navigable waters within the said state shall be common highways and forever free,' was held not to deprive the state of the power possessed by it to authorize the erection of bridges over navigable waters. Said the court, page 211, L. ed. p. 961, Sup. Ct. Rep. p. 426, 'the clause, therefore, in the act admitting California, quoted above, upon which the complainant relies, must be considered, according to these decisions, as in no way impairing the power which the state could exercise over the subject if the clause had no existence.' To the same effect, Willamette Iron Bridge Co. v. Hatch, 125 U. S. 1, 31 L. ed. 629, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 811; Hamilton v. Vicksburg, S. & P. R. Co. 119 U. S. 280, 284, 30 L. ed. 393, 395, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 206.

In Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co. v. Ohio, 165 U. S. 365, 41 L. ed. 747, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 357, it was held that the act of September 19, 1890 [26 Stat. at L. 426, chap. 907], conferring upon the Secretary of War the authority to direct the alteration of such bridges so as to render navigation easy and unobstructed, did not deprive the states of authority to bridge such streams.

While all of these cases turned upon the power of the state to authorize the erection of bridges, the same principle applies where the legislature deems it necessary to the public welfare to make other improvements for the reclamation of swampy and overflowed lands, though certain individual proprietors may thereby be subjected to expense. The question whether Kinloch creek could be obstructed without the permission of the Secretary of War does not arise in this case, and is specially disclaimed by the plaintiff. See Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co. v. Ohio, 165 U. S. 365, 41 L. ed. 747, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 357; Leovy v. United States, 177 U. S. 621, 633, 44 L. ed. 914, 919, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 797; Cummings v. Chicago, 188 U. S. 410, 47 L. ed. 525, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 472; Montgomery v. Portland, 190 U. S. 89, 47 L. ed. 965, 23 Sup. Ct. Rep. 735.

The main argument was addressed to the question whether the contract of August, 1898, providing for the removal of the obstruction on December 31 and the free ingress and egress through the creek thereafter, was impaired by the act of the general assembly of 1903, permitting the defendants by name to construct and maintain the dam in question.

It is the settled law of this court that the interdiction of statutes impairing the obligation of constracts does not prevent the state from exercising such powers as are vested...

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