U.S. Supreme Court Clarification

To clarify its decision, the court made it clear that the title to a stable island in the Mississippi would not change merely because the main channel might change from one side of the island to the other.

But addressing the shifted island’s ownership the court said,

“The land described in the declaration a mile lower down the river and situated in the State of Illinois on the other side of the river is manifestly not the land to which the City of St. Louis so acquired title.”

Continuing, the court said,

“The right of accretion to an island in the river cannot be so extended lengthwise of the river as to exclude riparian proprietors above or below such island from access to the river.

To such a moveable island, traveling for more than a mile from one state to another, the law of title by accretion can have no application, for its progress is not imperceptible in a legal sense.”