Rhode Island v. Massachusetts | |
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Decided February 21, 1838 | |
Full case name | The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Complainants v. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Defendant |
Citations | 37 U.S. 657 ( more ) |
Holding | |
Supreme Court has original jurisdiction over a suit by one state against another over their shared border | |
Court membership | |
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Case opinions | |
Majority | Baldwin, joined by Thompson, McLean, Wayne, Catron, McKinley |
Concurrence | Barbour |
Dissent | Taney |
Story took no part in the consideration or decision of the case. |
Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 37 U.S. (12 Pet.) 657 (1838), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court asserted its original jurisdiction over a suit in equity, a boundary dispute between Massachusetts and Rhode Island dating to colonial times.
James I had granted the original charter in November 1621. [1] The dispute, which had lasted over 200 years, was over Narragansett Bay. [2] [1] To settle the dispute, Rhode Island moved for a subpoena on 16 March, 1832. [3] Daniel Webster represented Massachusetts.
The Court determined that the compact between the two colonies made in 1711-1718 should govern the boundary line between the states, and therefore confirmed the existing boundary line, rejecting Rhode Island's interpretation of the colonial charters, which would have put the border further into Massachusetts.
The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations was one of the original Thirteen Colonies established on the east coast of America, bordering the Atlantic Ocean. It was founded by Roger Williams. It was an English colony from 1636 until 1707, and then a colony of Great Britain until the American Revolution in 1776, when it became the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.
The Province of Massachusetts Bay was a colony in New England which became one of the thirteen original states of the United States. It was chartered on October 7, 1691, by William III and Mary II, the joint monarchs of the kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland, and was based in the merging of several earlier British colonies in New England. The charter took effect on May 14, 1692, and included the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the Plymouth Colony, the Province of Maine, Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick; the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is the direct successor. Maine has been a separate state since 1820, and Nova Scotia and New Brunswick are now Canadian provinces, having been part of the colony only until 1697.
The area that is now Massachusetts was colonized by English settlers in the early 17th century and became the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the 18th century. Before that, it was inhabited by a variety of Native American tribes. Massachusetts is named after the Massachusett tribe that inhabited the area of present-day Greater Boston. The Pilgrim Fathers who sailed on the Mayflower established the first permanent settlement in 1620 at Plymouth Colony which set precedents but never grew large. A large-scale Puritan migration began in 1630 with the establishment of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and that spawned the settlement of other New England colonies.
Luther v. Borden, 48 U.S. 1 (1849), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States established the political question doctrine in controversies arising under the Guarantee Clause of Article Four of the United States Constitution .
United States v. Maine, 469 U.S. 504 (1985), also known as the Rhode Island and New York Boundary Case, was a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, which held that Long Island Sound and Block Island Sound in part constitute a juridical bay under Article 7(6) of the Convention on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone, Long Island being an extension of the mainland and the southern headland of the bay, and (b) that the bay closed at the line drawn from Montauk Point at the eastern tip of Long Island to Watch Hill Point on the Rhode Island shore, the waters of the bay west of the closing line being internal state waters, and the waters of Block Island Sound east of that line being territorial waters and high seas. Maine is named in the title of the case because it is the northernmost of the thirteen defendant states with coastline on the Atlantic Ocean in a series of cases related to overlapping claims of state and federal jurisdiction over seas and the seafloor.
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Fowler v. Rhode Island, 345 U.S. 67 (1953), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that a municipal ordinance which was used to penalize a minister of Jehovah's Witnesses for preaching at a peaceful religious meeting in a public park, although other religious groups could conduct religious services there with impunity, violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
The Piscataqua River border dispute was a dispute between the US states of Maine and New Hampshire over ownership of Seavey’s Island in the Piscataqua River, which forms the border between Maine and New Hampshire. The dispute was settled in 2002 by the US Supreme Court in favor of Maine.
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44 Liquormart, Inc. v. Rhode Island, 517 U.S. 484 (1996), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that a complete ban on the advertising of alcohol prices was unconstitutional under the First Amendment, and that the Twenty-first Amendment, empowering the states to regulate alcohol, did not lessen other constitutional restraints of state power.
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Maryland v. West Virginia, 217 U.S. 1 (1910), is a 9-to-0 ruling by the United States Supreme Court which held that the boundary between the American states of Maryland and West Virginia is the south bank of the North Branch Potomac River. The decision also affirmed criteria for adjudicating boundary disputes between states, which said that decisions should be based on the specific facts of the case, applying the principles of law and equity in such a way that least disturbs private rights and title to land.
New Jersey v. New York, 523 U.S. 767 (1998), was a U.S. Supreme Court case that determined that roughly 83% of Ellis Island was part of New Jersey, rather than New York State.
The Penn–Calvert boundary dispute was a long-running legal conflict between William Penn and his heirs on one side, and Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore and his heirs on the other side. The overlapping nature of their charters of land in Colonial America required numerous attempts at mediation, surveying, and intervention by the king and courts of England to ultimately be resolved. Subsequent questions over these charters have also been adjudicated by American arbitrators and the Supreme Court of the United States. The boundary dispute shaped the eventual borders of five U.S. states: Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and West Virginia.
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