Hugo Black

“ This argument of the United States, accepted today by the Court, truly deserves the ironic tribute by counsel for Texas in oral argument that it works for the United States precisely as the old game of 'heads I win, tails you lose.' Moreover, the Court admits that if the United States wins, the boundary between state and federal lands will be an ambulatory one, with oil leases by the State constantly subject to invalidation as erosion takes its toll on the land along the shore. ”

“ All of this goes to emphasize to me that it has been a mistake for this Court to advance the view that these land boundaries should be settled by courts. Obviously, the best way to settle a boundary dispute, whether water or land, is to designate a governmental agency that can undertake the complex problem of determining and marking where the inland and territorial waters meet. As I have pointed out in my dissent in the Louisiana Boundary Case, decided today, Congress in 1895 passed an Act specifically charging a competent government department to consider and mark such a line. ”

“ No one of the international family of nations is greatly interested and certainly none can control the way in which another nation divides itself into subordinate governmental units for control of that country's own inland waters. ”