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States. The jurisdiction of the State of New Jersey was claimed "to extend down to the bay of New York, and to the channel midway of said bay," and this court sustained the claim. See Hamburg American Steamship Company v. Grube, 196 U. S. 407.

In the San Juan Water Boundary controversy between the United States and Great Britain, Emperor William I gave the award in favor of the United States, October 21, 1871, by deciding "that the boundary line between the territory of Her Brittanic Majesty and the United States should be drawn through the Haro Channel;" and it is apparent that the decision was based on the deep channel theory as applicable to sounds and arms of the sea, such as the straits of San Juan de Fuca; indeed in a subsequent definition of the boundary, signed by the Secretary of State, the British Minister, and the British representative, the boundary line was said to be prolonged until "it reaches the center of the fairway of the Straits of San Juan de Fuca." The fairway was the equivalent of the thalweg.

Again, in fixing the boundary line of the Detroit river, under the sixth and seventh articles of the treaty of Ghent, the deep water channel was adopted, giving Belle Isle to the United States as lying north of that channel.

So in the Alaskan Boundary case, the majority of the arbitration tribunal, made up of Baron Alverstone, Lord Chief Justice of England, Mr. Secretary Root, and Senators Lodge and Turner, held that the middle of the Portland Channel was the proper boundary line and included Wales Island, to the north of which the channel passed. This sustained the American contention in regard to the thalweg and the island lying south of it.

But counsel contend that the rule "as to the flow of the midchannel or thalweg of the river Iberville (now known as Manchac) through the east, through Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain expires by its own limitation when such midchannel reaches Lake Borgne, which in contemplation of the rule is the

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open sea, and part of the waters of the Gulf of Mexico." contention is inconsistent, as matter of fact, with the allegation of the cross bill that "the Mississippi Sound was recognized as a body of water six leagues wide, wholly within the State of Mississippi from Lake Borgne to the Alabama line, separate and distinct from the Gulf of Mexico," and with Mississippi's Exbibit Map A presenting her claim, while the record shows that the strip of water, part of Lake Borgne and Mississippi Sound, is not an open sea but a very shallow arm of the sea, having outside of the deep water channel an inconsiderable depth.

The maritime belt is that part of the sea which, in contradistinction to the open sea, is under the sway of the riparian States, which can exclusively reserve the fishery within their respective maritime belts for their own citizens, whether fish, or pearls, or amber, or other products of the sea. See Manchester v. Massachusetts, 139 U. S. 240; McCready v. Virginia, 94 U. S. 391.

In Manchester v. Massachusetts, the court said: "We think it must be regarded as established that, as between nations, the minimum limit of the territorial jurisdiction of a nation over tide waters is a marine league from its coast; that bays wholly within its territory not exceeding two marine leagues in width at the mouth are within this limit; and that included in this territorial jurisdiction is the right of control over fisheries, whether the fish be migratory, free swimming fish, or free moving fish, or fish attached to or embedded in the soil. The open sea within this limit is, of course, subject to the common right of navigation; and all governments, for the purpose of self protection in time of war or for the prevention of frauds on its revenue, exercise an authority beyond this limit."

Questions as to the breadth of the maritime belt or the extent of the sway of the riparian States require no special consideration here. The facts render such discussion unnecessary.

Islands formed by alluvion were held by Lord Stowell, in respect of certain mud islands at the mouth of the Mississippi,

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to be "natural appendages of the coast on which they border, and from which indeed they are formed." The Anna (1805), 5 C. Rob. 373.

As to these particular waters, the observations of Mr. Hall, 4th ed. p. 129, are in point: "Off the coast of Florida, among the Bahamas, along the shores of Cuba, and in the Pacific, are to be found groups of numerous islands and islets rising out of vast banks, which are covered with very shoal water, and either form a line more or less parallel with land or compose systems of their own, in both cases enclosing considerable sheets of water, which are sometimes also shoal and sometimes relatively deep. The entrance to these interior bays or lagoons may be wide in breadth of surface water, but it is narrow in navigable water."

He then states the specific case of the Archipiélago de los Canarios on the coast of Cuba, and says: "In cases of this sort the question whether the interior waters are, or are not, lakes enclosed within the territory, must always depend upon the depth upon the banks, and the width of the entrances. Each must be judged upon its own merits. But in the instance cited, there can be little doubt that the whole Archipiélago de los Canarios is a mere salt water lake, and that the boundary of the land of Cuba runs along the exterior edge of the bank."

In such circumstances as exist in the present case, we perceive no reason for declining to apply the rule of the thalweg in determining the boundary.

4. Moreover, it appears from the record that the various departments of the United States Government have recognized Louisiana's ownership of the disputed area; that Louisiana has always asserted it; and that Mississippi has repeatedly recognized it, and not until recently has disputed it.

The question is one of boundary, and this court has many times held that, as between the States of the Union, long acquiescence in the assertion of a particular boundary and the exercise of dominion and sovereignty over the territory within it, should be accepted as conclusive, whatever the international

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rule might be in respect of the acquisition by prescription of large tracts of country claimed by both. Virginia v. Tennessee, 148 U. S. 503; Indiana v. Kentucky, 136 U. S. 479; Missouri v. Kentucky, 11 Wall. 395; Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 4 How. 591.

The Louisiana Enabling Act of February 20, 1811, provided that all the waste and unappropriated lands in said State should be and remain the property of the United States Government. In the disputed area of to-day are included lands and waters located in various townships, all of which are enumerated in the southeastern land district of Louisiana, east of the Mississippi river. The lands in these townships were surveyed by the Government about the year 1842, all of them as being in and forming a part of the State of Louisiana. By the Swamp Land Grants of 1849 and 1850, the United States granted to certain States the swamp and overflowed lands within their respective limits, in order that these lands might be reclaimed, protected from overflow, and brought into use. Louisiana made application to the United States for the approval to her of these lands as being part of her territory and situated within her limits. They all lay south of the deep water channel and were all approved to the State of Louisiana May 6, 1852. They were then offered by the State through the register of the state land office for sale and many sales of them were made from time to time to individuals and patents issued therefor in various years from 1853 to 1894. In 1892, in furtherance of the better protection of the lands of the parishes of St. Bernard and Plaquemines from overflow, the legislature of Louisiana adopted an act which created a Lake Borgne Basin Levee Commission, and provided a board of commissioners therefor as a department of the state government, and the register of the state land office was authorized to transfer all of the unsold lands to the board, which was done in April, 1895. The board was authorized by law to sell these lands and also to levy taxes to be used in establishing a protective levee system in the district. The board made sales of a considerable number of acres

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to different individuals from September 16, 1898, to March 7, 1902. Isle à Pitre was composed of certain enumerated sections of township ten, south of range twenty east, and these lands were approved to Louisiana by the Commissioner of the General Land Office of the United States May 6, 1852, as forming part of that State, and they were subsequently patented, sold and conveyed to various individuals, the chain of title extending from 1852, a period of over fifty years. The lands forming Isle à Pitre have been paying taxes to the State of Louisiana for years. Political and police control and jurisdiction by the parish of St. Bernard officials were exercised over the disputed area, and many instances are given of police control and jurisdiction by Louisiana officials over this general territory. This territory consisted, as heretofore stated, of what was known as the Louisiana Marshes, and it is admitted that they have immemorially been known by that name, though some of the witnesses for Mississippi said that they were also known as Grand Marshes, admitting, however, that they were quite as frequently called the Louisiana Marshes.

Some other matters may properly be referred to as showing the general understanding of and acquiescence in the boundary asserted by Louisiana.

In January, 1901, the Superintendent of the Coast and Geodetic Survey was applied to by a member of the House of Representatives from Mississippi for information in regard to the boundary line between Louisiana and Mississippi in the present disputed area, and Hodgkins, an assistant in the Department, a well-known expert in such matters, made a report January 30, 1901, which, after considering the subject in all its phases, showed that the correct boundary between the two States in the locality is the deep water sailing channel line contended for by Louisiana.

The United States Geological Survey published in the year 1900 a bulletin devoted to a discussion of the boundaries of the States and Territories, and giving a history of changes as they may have occurred. The third edition was published in

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