United States v. Kansas City Life Insurance Co. (339 U.S. 799)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 5, 1950 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 339 U.S. 799 · 70 S. Ct. 885
- Docket
- No. 1
- Argued
- October 20, 1948; reargued March 29, 1950
- Decided
- June 5, 1950
- Term
- October Term 1949
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice Burton
- Issue area
- Due Process
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
How the Justices voted
- Majority
- Chief Justice Vinson, Justice Clark, Justice Burton (wrote), Justice R. H. Jackson, Justice Frankfurter
- Dissenting
- Justice Minton (wrote), Justice Douglas (wrote), Justice Reed, Justice Black
Opinion excerpt
Mr. Justice Burton delivered the opinion of the Court. The respondent, Kansas City Life Insurance Company, obtained judgment in the Court of Claims against the United States for $22,519.60, with interest from August 8, 1938. 109 Ct. Cl. 555, 74 F. Supp. 653. This sum was awarded as just compensation for the destruction of the agricultural value of respondent’s farm land by the United States in artificially maintaining the Mississippi River in that vicinity continuously at ordinary high-water level. The land was not in any sense within the bed of the river. It was one and one-half miles from the river on a nonnavigable tributary creek. Its surface was a few feet above the ordinary high-water level of both the river and the creek. The United States, however, contended that because it maintained the river at this level in the interest of navigation it need not pay for the resulting destruction of the value of the respondent’s land. We granted certiorari because of the importance of the constitutional questions raised. 334 U. S. 810. The case was argued at the 1948 Term and reargued at this Term. Two principal issues are presented. The first is whether the United States, in the exercise of its power to regulate commerce, may raise a navigable stream to its ordinary high-water mark and maintain it continuously at that level in the interest of navigation, without liability for the…
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