''New Jersey v. New York'', 523 U.S. 767 (1998), was a U.S. Supreme Court case that determined that roughly 83% of

Ellis Island Ellis Island is a federally owned island in New York Harbor, situated within the U.S. states of New York and New Jersey, that was the busiest immigrant inspection and processing station in the United States. From 1892 to 1954, nearly 12 mil ...

was part of

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delawa ...

, rather than

New York State New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. sta ...

. Because the New Jersey's original 1664 land grant was unclear, the states of New Jersey and New York disputed ownership and jurisdiction over the

Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between Ne ...

and its islands. The two states entered into a compact ratified by

Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...

in 1834, which set a boundary line to be the middle of the Hudson River, but giving all islands in the river (including Ellis Island) to New York. From 1890 to 1934, the

federal government A federation (also known as a federal state) is a political entity characterized by a union of partially self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a central federal government ( federalism). In a federation, the self-gover ...

expanded Ellis Island through

land reclamation Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamat ...

to accommodate its immigration station. Starting in the 1980s, New Jersey contended that the new portions of the Ellis Island were part of New Jersey. New Jersey filed suit in 1997. In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that because the 1834 compact gave New Jersey jurisdiction over submerged land around Ellis Island, the new land was in New Jersey, not New York. The ruling changed little in practice, as the federal government holds title to Ellis Island. The ruling changed allocation of sales tax revenue, and future development plans for the island.

History

After the British takeover of

New Netherland New Netherland ( nl, Nieuw Nederland; la, Novum Belgium or ) was a 17th-century colonial province of the Dutch Republic that was located on the east coast of what is now the United States. The claimed territories extended from the Delmarva ...

in 1664, the

Province of New Jersey The Province of New Jersey was one of the Middle Colonies of Colonial America and became the U.S. state of New Jersey in 1783. The province had originally been settled by Europeans as part of New Netherland but came under English rule after t ...

was founded as a separate entity from the

Province of New York The Province of New York (1664–1776) was a British proprietary colony and later royal colony on the northeast coast of North America. As one of the Middle Colonies, New York achieved independence and worked with the others to found the U ...

. An unusual clause in New Jersey's colonial land grant named the territory as being "westward of Long Island, and Manhitas Island and bounded on the east part by the main sea, and part by Hudson's river," rather than at the river's midpoint, as was common in other colonial charters. The boundary between the states of

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

and

remained disputed around the

. The states convened conferences as early as 1807 to resolve the state line but did not reach agreement. In 1831, New Jersey sued New York in the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

over the dispute, but dropped the case in 1836. Instead, the two states negotiated a compact in 1833, ratified by the

US Congress The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washin ...

in 1834. Among other agreements, the compact established that New York owned Ellis Island, but New Jersey owned the submerged lands around Ellis Island. Ellis Island 1890 - 1935 NPS map

The

, which owned Ellis Island, expanded it from to by

between 1890 and 1934 to support its use as an immigration station. New Jersey contended that the artificial portions of the island were part of New Jersey because the submerged land under it belonged to New Jersey. Jurisdictional disputes re-emerged in the 1980s, with the renovation of Ellis Island, and then again in the 1990s, with proposed redevelopment of the south side. In 1992, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled that New York's law should apply in a case that happened on the new part of the island.

Court case

New Jersey sued in 1993. The Supreme Court appointed Paul R. Verkuil to be special master to gather evidence in the decision. In 1997, Verkuil recommended in favor of New Jersey's claim to the artificial parts of Ellis Island. In 1998, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of New Jersey. Since the land added by the federal government was not expressly granted to New York by the interstate compact, and it had been placed in water that had been expressly granted to New Jersey, the majority ruled that the "new" land, which was now decades old, must belong to New Jersey. The minority used historical reasons and "common-sense inference" as its basis for supporting New York's claim. According to the court decision, the original 2.74-acre Ellis Island remains under the jurisdiction of New York, but land reclaimed from the waters afterward is under the jurisdiction of New Jersey. The island covers a land area of .

Aftermath

Both states jointly negotiated a post-trial settlement to decide the borders in accordance with the Supreme Court's decision. The original island and other areas negotiated in the post-trial settlement, totaling (17.0%), remain part of New York, which is a landlocked

enclave An enclave is a territory (or a small territory apart of a larger one) that is entirely surrounded by the territory of one other state or entity. Enclaves may also exist within territorial waters. ''Enclave'' is sometimes used improperly to deno ...

within New Jersey. The case is possibly the first to use a

geographic information system A geographic information system (GIS) is a type of database containing geographic data (that is, descriptions of phenomena for which location is relevant), combined with software tools for managing, analyzing, and visualizing those data. In a ...

in determining a Supreme Court decision. Although the court decision has changed the state territorial sovereignty of most parts of the island, the actual current landowner and holder of the

title A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. It may signify either generation, an official position, or a professional or academic qualification. In some languages, titles may be inserted between the f ...

of Ellis Island is the federal government. Very few activities on the island were directly affected by the transfer of sovereignty, but the decision affected some instances of sales taxes.

References

General References

Beyer Blinder Belle Beyer Blinder Belle Architects & Planners LLP (BBB) is an international architecture firm. It is based in New York City and has an additional office in Washington, DC. The firm's name is derived from the three founding partners: John H. Beyer, Ri ...

; Anderson Notter Finegold (1988). Ellis Island, Statue of Liberty National Monument. Historic Structure Report: Main Building. U.S. Department of the Interior / National Park Service. *

General Services Administration The General Services Administration (GSA) is an independent agency of the United States government established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of federal agencies. GSA supplies products and communications for U.S. gover ...

SAOffice of Legal Counsel
Ellis Island: Its Legal Status
February 11, 1963. Archived fro
the original
on August 4, 2012. * Verkuil, Paul R
Final Report of the Special Master
March 31, 1997. Archived fro
the original
on August 7, 2022.
New Jersey v. New York
1998. 523 U.S. 767. pp. 767-832 (PDF pp. 891-956). * {{USArticleI United States Supreme Court cases 1998 politics in New York (state) 1998 in New Jersey 1998 in United States case law Borders of New York (state) Borders of New Jersey Internal territorial disputes of the United States Ellis Island Legal history of New Jersey Legal history of New York (state) United States Supreme Court cases of the Rehnquist Court United States Supreme Court original jurisdiction cases