United States Supreme Court Cases & Opinions

U.S. Supreme Court

Hughes v. United States, 230 U.S. 24 (1913)

Hughes v. United States

No. 718, 719

Submitted January 10, 1913

Decided Jur 16, 1913

230 U.S. 24

Syllabus

Jackson v. United States, ante, p. 230 U. S. 1, followed to effect that the United States is not liable for damages caused by overflow of lands in the Mississippi Valley caused by the levees constructed by state and federal authority for protection from overflow and improvement of navigation, and that such overflow does not amount to a taking of property within the Fifth Amendment.

The wrongful act of an officer of the United States, such as dynamiting a levee in an emergency so as to prevent the water from interfering with other work under construction, is not the act of the United States, nor does it amount to taking for public use the property overflowed as a result of the dynamiting.

45 Ct.Cl. 517 affirmed.

The facts, which involve the question of liability of the United States for damages alleged to have been sustained by the owner of a plantation in the Mississippi River Valley by reason of the improvements of the Mississippi River under direction of the federal Commission charged with that work, are stated in the opinion.