Marine and Coastal Law

This book brings together the leading cases in United States marine and coastal law, thereby capturing both the historical development of the law and the most important contemporary cases of interest to the student and the practitioner. Conceptually, the book moves from the shore to the high seas, beginning with the foundations of coastal law and ending with recent marine pollution disasters.



At the outset, the ownership and boundaries of submerged lands are explored, followed by the leading cases delineating the public trust doctrine. That doctrine, which controls the ownership and transfer of submerged and filled lands, has played a critical role in the redevelopment of American urban waterfronts. The rights and responsibilities of coastal land owners are discussed in chapters involving riparian rights, the federal navigational servitude, and the public's increasing demands for access to the shore. The congressional response to multiple use conflicts along the shore, the Coastal Zone Management Act, is explored along with the critical problem of when a regulation goes too far and becomes a taking. Subsequent chapters examine state and federal regulation of fisheries, Indian fishing rights, and the Magnuson Act, which expanded U.S. jurisdiction over fisheries to 200 miles off shore. Finally, Nixon examines some of the key issues in admiralty law, with an emphasis on catastrophic oil pollution from tankers. This is an innovative text invaluable to students and practitioners of maritime law as well as those involved with coastal management and marine affairs.