Tidelands Oil Controversy

Tidelands Oil Controversy Until World War II, jurisdiction and control over a three‐mile band of “tidelands” adjacent to ocean coasts was exercised by the states and not the federal government. States authorized offshore fishing and imposed limited regulation over other coastal activity. Then in the 1920s and 1930s, California, Louisiana, and Texas offered offshore oil leases and scientists indicated that the oceans might be a major source of oil and gas. State and federal officials saw the potential for revenues from leasing mineral rights to coastal tidelands and began the debate over who should control the resources in these tidelands.

In 1945, President Harry S. Truman issued the Continental Shelf Proclamation, asserting federal jurisdiction over all the mineral resources in the lands beneath the oceans, out to the end of the United States' continental shelf. Immediately after the proclamation, the United States commenced litigation against the states, claiming sovereignty over all offshore resources, including those historically controlled by the states. In United States v. California (1947) and later cases, the Supreme Court held that the federal government had “paramount rights” over the area three miles seaward from the normal low‐water mark. States had no title to, nor property interest in, the waters and submerged lands off their coasts. The state‐federal “tidelands” dispute became a campaign issue in the presidential election of 1952. Congress passed bills seeking to overrule the Supreme Court and affirm state coastal rights, but Truman vetoed them. As a result of campaign promises made by Dwight Eisenhower, who won the 1952 election, Congress in 1953 enacted the Submerged Lands Act, which gave coastal states title to offshore lands within their historic boundaries and exclusive rights to the resources in those areas. In most cases, this meant the three‐mile territorial sea.

Coastal states and the United States continue Supreme Court litigation over claims of historic states' rights to coastal waters beyond three miles (up to three marine leagues or 10.5 miles). In almost all cases such claims were rejected, but as recently as 1986, the Supreme Court was continuing to resolve these claims on a case‐by‐case basis.

Beginning in the 1970s, the states shifted the issue from control of resources to control of activity. Concerned about federal oil and gas leasing, fishing regulation, and pollution, they sought state control over all federal offshore activities that affected their coasts and coastal waters. They secured funding for management of these zones and a right to policy input.

In December 1988, President Ronald Reagan, following the new international law rule, declared a twelve‐mile territorial sea for the United States. But he stated that this new claim related only to U.S. rights against other nations and was not to affect the present state‐federal division of jurisdiction. States, opposed by the federal government, are now urging Congress to apply the philosophy of the original Submerged Lands Act, which adopted the territorial sea zone as the basis for state control, and expand their jurisdiction out to twelve miles. The “tidelands controversy” continues.

See also Dual Federalism; Federalism.

Martin H. Belsky