I. THE NATIONAL DOMAIN. § 125. "The territorial property of a state consists in the territory occupied by the state community and subjected to its sovereignty, and it comprises the whole area, whether of land or water, included within definite boundaries ascertained by occupation, prescription, or treaty, together with such inhabited or uninhabited lands as are considered to have become attendant on the ascertained territory through occupation or accretion, and, when such area abuts upon the sea, together with a certain margin of water." Hall Int. Law (4th ed.), § 30, p. 106; Scott's Cases on Int. Law, citing As to occupation, see supra, §§ 80, 81. As to prescription, see supra, § 88. II. TERRITORIAL LIMITS. 1. ARTIFICIAL LINES. $126. Where a treaty provides that the boundary between two countries shall follow certain parallels of latitude, or certain straight lines running from point to point. which parallels and lines shall be surveyed and marked by commissioners upon the land, and, as agreed upon and established by the commissioners, shall in all time be faithfully respected, without any variation therein, unless by express and free consent of both countries, "the monuments placed by the commissioners, or the line as otherwise fixed by descriptive words referring to natural objects, or by the drawings and maps of the commissioners, would, it is plain, be conclusive in all time by force of the stipulations of the treaty. It would be the line agreed upon and established, even although it should afterwards appear that, by reason of error of astronomical observations or of calculation, it varied from the parallel of latitude where that was the line, or in the other part did not make exactly a straight line." Cushing, At.-Gen. (1856), 8 Op. 175-176, referring to the treaty between By the treaty between the United States and Spain, concluded February 22, 1819, Article II., the boundary between the two countries, after following the western bank of the river Sabine from the sea to the thirty-second degree of north latitude, was to proceed by a certain course to the Rio Roxo, or Red River, and thence by that river westward to the degree of longitude 100 west from London and 23 from Washington; . . . the whole being as laid down in Melish's map of the United States, published at Philadelphia, improved to the first of January, 1818." By Article IV. the contracting parties, in order “to fix this line with more precision, and to place the landmarks which shall designate exactly the limits of both nations," agreed to appoint commissioners and surveyors "to run and mark the said line." It was held that, while Melish's map was adopted as the basis of the settlement, and was to have the same effect as if it had been expressly made a part of the treaty, yet, looking at the entire instrument, it was clear that the contracting parties intended, as shown by Article IV., that the line should be subsequently fixed with more precision, and that, in referring to the one hundredth meridian, they meant that meridian as astronomically located, and not necessarily as it appeared in the map, where it was in fact laid down far east of its true position. United States r. Texas (1896), 162 U. S. 1. This case related to the territory sometimes called Greer County, which was claimed by Texas. It was held not to be within the limits of that State, but to be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. 2. MOUNTAINS AND HILLS. § 127. "Where a boundary follows mountains or hills, the water divide constitutes the frontier." Hall, Int. Law (4th ed.), § 38, p. 127. This rule, while simple enough in principle, is often exceedingly difficult of application. As to the question of the "Highlands," in the northeastern boundary between the United States and the British possessions, see Moore, Int. Arbitrations. I. 65-68, 78, 100, 109, 114, 131, 158-161. As to the question between the watershed and highest mountain peaks, in the Argentine-Chilean boundary, see id. V. 4854. As to the case of a plateau, see the British-Portuguese arbitration concerning the boundaries of Manica land, id. V. 4985 et seq. 3. RIVERS. (1) DIVISIONAL LINES. $128. "Where a navigable river forms the boundary of conterminous states, the middle of the channel-the filum aquae or thalwegis generally taken as the line of their separation, the presumption of law being that the right of navigation is common to them both. But this presumption may be rebutted or destroyed by actual proof of the exclusive title of one of the riparian proprietors to the entire river. Such title may have been acquired by prior occupancy, purchase, cession, treaty, or any one of the modes by which other public territory may be acquired. But where the river not only separates the conterminous states, but also their territorial jurisdictions, the thalweg, or middle channel, forms the line of separation through the bays and estuaries through which the waters of the river flow into the sea. As a general rule, this line runs through the middle of the deepest channel, although it may divide the river and its estuaries into two very unequal parts. But the deeper channel may be less suited, or totally unfit, for the purposes of navigation, in which case the dividing line would be in the middle of the one which is best suited and ordinarily used for that object. The division of the islands in the river and its bays would follow the same rule." Halleck, Int. Law (Baker's ed.), I. 171. Hall observes: “Upon whatever grounds property in the entirety of a stream or lake is established, it would seem in all cases to carry with it a right to the opposite bank as accessory to the use of the stream, and perhaps it even gives a right to a sufficient margin for defensive or revenue purposes, when the title is derived from occupation, or from a treaty of which the object is to mark out a political frontier." See his discussion of this statement, with examples and distinctions. (Hall, Int. Law, 4th ed. 128-129.) When a great river is the boundary between two nations or states, if the original property is in neither and there be no convention respecting it, each holds to the middle of the stream. But where a state which is the original proprietor grants the territory on one side only, it retains the river within its own domains, and the newlyerected state extends to the river only. In such case the low-water mark is its boundary, whether the fluctuations in the stream result from tides or from an annual rise and fall. Handly . Anthony, 5 Wheaton, 374. In a disputed boundary case, in which a state was held to have ownership of soil and jurisdiction in the bed of a river, the bed of the river was defined to include "that portion of its soil which is alternately covered and left bare as there may be an increase or diminution in the supply of water, and which is adequate to contain it at its average and mean stage during the entire year, without reference to the extraordinary freshets of the winter or spring, or the extreme droughts of the summer or autumn.” It was also held that in places where the bank was not defined, the line must be continued up the river on the line of its bed, as defined above. State of Alabama v. State of Georgia, 23 Howard, 505. “When a navigable river constitutes the boundary between two independent states, the line defining the point at which the jurisdiction of the two separates is well established to be the middle of the main channel of the stream. The interest of each state in the navigation of the river admits of no other line. The preservation by each of its equal right in the navigation of the stream is the subject of paramount interest. It is, therefore, laid down in all the recognized treatises on international law of modern times that the middle of the channel of the stream marks the true boundary between the adjoining states up to which each state will on its side exercise jurisdiction. In international law, therefore, and by the usage of European nations. the term middle of the stream,' as applied to a navigable river, is the same as the middle of the channel of such stream, and in that sense the terms are used in the treaty of peace between Great Britain, France, and Spain, concluded at Paris in 1763. By the language, ‘a line drawn along the middle of the river Mississippi from its source to the river Iberville,' as there used, is meant along the middle of the channel of the river Mississippi. "The reason and necessity of the rule of international law as to the midchannel being the true boundary line of a navigable river separating independent states may not be as cogent in this country, where neighboring States are under the same General Government, as in Europe, yet the same rule will be held to obtain unless changed by statute or usage of so great a length of time as to have acquired the force of law. "As we have stated, in international law and by the usage of European nations, the terms 'middle of the stream' and 'midchannel' of a navigable river are synonymous and interchangeably used. The enabling act of April 18, 1818, (3 Stat. 428, c. 67,) under which Illinois adopted a constitution and became a State and was admitted into the Union, made the middle of the Mississippi River the western boundary of the State. The enabling act of March 6, 1820, (3 Stat. c. 22, sec. 2, p. 545,) under which Missouri became a State and was admitted into the Union, made the middle of the main channel of the Mississippi River the eastern boundary, so far as its boundary was conterminous with the western boundary of Illinois. The enabling act of August 6, 1846, (9 Stat. 56, c. 89,) under which Wisconsin adopted a constitution and became a State and was admitted into the Union, gives the western boundary of that State, after reaching the river St. Croix, as follows: Thence down the main channel of said river to the Mississippi, thence down the centre of the main channel |