Opinion of the Court. arose, and in the latter case, in speaking of some of the riparian rights of an owner upon the banks of a navigable stream, the court said: "What these rights are, especially in regard to land acquired originally from the United States, and bordering, as this does, upon the Mississippi River, we regard as fully and correctly settled by the Federal Supreme Court. Dutton v. Strong, 1 Black, 23; Railroad Company v. Schurmeier, 7 Wall. 272; Yates v. Milwaukee, 10 Wall. 497. According to the doctrine of these decisions the plaintiff possessed the right to enjoy free communication between his abutting premises and the navigable channel of the river, to build and maintain, for his own and the public use, suitable landing places, wharves and piers, on and in front of his land, and to extend the same therefrom into the river to the point of navigability, even though beyond low-water mark, and to this extent exclusively to occupy, for such and like purposes, the bed of the stream, subordinate and subject only to the navigable rights of the public and such needful rules and regulations for their protection as may be prescribed by competent legislative authority. The rights which thus belong to him as riparian owner of the abutting premises were valuable property rights, of which he could not be divested without consent, except by due process of law, and, if for public purposes, upon just compensation. Yates v. Milwaukee, 10 Wall. 497." In Union Depot Street Railway v. Brunswick and others, 31 Minnesota, 297, it was held to be the settled law of Minnesota that a riparian owner upon a navigable stream has the fee to low-water mark; and that in addition he owns as an incident to his ownership certain riparian rights, among which are the right to enjoy free communication between his abutting premises and the navigable channel of the stream, to build and maintain suitable piers, landings or wharves on and in front of his land, and to extend the same therefrom into the stream to the point of navigability even beyond low-water mark, and to this extent exclusively to occupy for such and like purposes the bed of the stream, subordinate only to the paramount public right of navigation. These riparian rights Opinion of the Court. the court held to be property, and that they were not to be taken by the State without paying just compensation therefor. The rights which were held subordinate only to the paramount public right of navigation were those mentioned by the court, and not a word was said as to the right of flowage, which was not involved and was not alluded to. In Morrill v. St. Anthony Falls Water Power Company, supra, the Supreme Court of Minnesota held that the riparian owner of lands upon a navigable stream may use the water flowing past his land for any purpose, so long as he does not impede navigation, in the absence of any counterclaim by the State or the United States. It will be seen that this case does not refer to the right to receive the full amount of the natural flowage from above, but only to the right to use that which does flow, in the absence of any counterclaim by the State or the United States. The same general statement of the rights of riparian owners is made in Hanford v. St. Paul & Duluth Railroad, supra. That case treats of the rights of a riparian owner in the bed of the stream above low-water mark as subject to the right of the public to use the same for the purposes of navigation, and adds that "restricted only by that paramount public right, the riparian owner enjoys valuable proprietary privileges, among which we shall consider particularly the right to the use of the land itself for private purposes. Sub ject only to the limitation that he shall not interfere with the public right of navigation, he has the unquestionable and exclusive right to construct and maintain suitable landings, piers and wharves into the water and up to the point of navigability for his own private use and benefit (citing cases). And it is obviously immaterial, if the public interests be not prejudiced, whether the submerged land be covered with wharves of timber or stone, or be reclaimed from the water by filling in with earth so that it becomes dry land. The land may be so reclaimed." It is also said in the course of the opinion: "The limit to the private right is imposed by the public right, and the private right exists up to the point beyond which it would be inconsistent with the public right.” VOL. CLXVIII-24 Opinion of the Court. All this was said in regard to the case then under discussion, which related to the right of a riparian proprietor to reclaim the submerged land to the point of navigability, and to alienate the same so that the alienee might have the rights of the riparian owner, although having no interest in the original riparian estate. The question here involved was neither decided nor considered. In Schurmeier v. St. Paul & Pacific Railroad Company, 10 Minnesota, 82, which was affirmed in 7 Wall. 272, it was held that the grantee from the United States had his line bounded by the river, at least to low-water mark, and when after the grant was made to him he platted it into blocks as part of the town of St. Paul that he still retained in the land over which the streets and landing were laid the fee, subject only to the use of the public for the purposes designated, and that the railroad company, having no legal authority to use the streets or landing for railroad tracks, and such use being a special injury to the plaintiff, he was entitled to an injunction. In that case Mr. Chief Justice Wilson, in the state court, was of the opinion that the riparian proprietor went to the middle of the river; that that was the rule at common law, and, in his opinion, there was no reason to doubt that the common law prevailed in Minnesota as to that question; but while so holding, as his individual opinion, he said that other authorities regarded the boundary line of the riparian proprietor to be low-water mark, and even on that assumption the place in dispute was within the title of the riparian proprietor. The state court subsequently decided that the title of a riparian owner on a navigable stream went only to low-water mark. St. Anthony Falls Water Power Company v. City of Minneapolis, supra, does not decide the point contended for by the plaintiffs in error. It was a contest between private parties as to the effect of a certain deed in reserving rights to the grantor and as to the extent of the right of flowage contained in the deed. The question here under discussion was not even remotely affected. Opinion of the Court. We have looked in vain among all the cases in the state court, cited by counsel for the plaintiffs in error, for any decision upon this question. Whatever may be the rights of the plaintiffs in error under their charters or as the riparian owners of land to build and maintain their dams to the centre of the stream, there is no decision cited which holds that they are entitled to the use of all the water which would naturally flow past their lands and over their dams so constructed, nor has the state court decided that the only right of the State, to which this alleged right of the plaintiffs in error is subject or subordinate in any way, is limited to the right of the State to control or use the bed of the stream and the waters therein for purposes of navigation only. That limitation has never been placed upon the State with reference to the point here in question. The state Supreme Court in deciding this particular case was not therefore announcing a rule which was at all inconsistent with or opposed to any of its former decisions; and as the extent of the riparian rights in this case was a subject committed to the jurisdiction of the State of Minnesota, we are bound, so far as this question is concerned, to follow the decision of the highest court of that State as announced in this case. (3) If wrong in their above contentions, the plaintiffs in error then assert that their charters granted in 1856, and set forth so far as material in the foregoing statement of facts, gave and guaranteed to them the right to use and develop the water power of St. Anthony Falls, and authorized them to build such structures in and upon the river as were necessary to develop that power, and that when these provisions of their charters were accepted and acted upon, they became contract obligations between the State of Minnesota and the plaintiffs, and that the statute above mentioned, authorizing the defendant to divert some portion of the natural flow of the water without compensation to the plaintiffs, was a violation of the Federal Constitution, as impairing the obligation of the contracts contained in the charters referred to. We think this contention cannot be maintained. We are of opinion that the true construction of these territorial Opinion of the Court. charters does not give such contract rights as are claimed by the plaintiffs in error. They were grants of power to the respective companies, under which they were licensed to build their dams out into the river for the purpose of utilizing the power, and of using the water that flowed down the river. These grants were in legal effect subject at all times to the paramount right of the State as trustee for the public to divert a portion of the waters for public uses, and they were also subject to the rights in regard to navigation and commerce existing in the General Government under the Constitution of the United States. See also upon this subject, Watuppa &c. Co. v. Fall River, 147 Mass. 548; City of Auburn v. Union Waterpower Co., 38 Atlantic Rep. 561, Supreme Court of Maine, Oct., 1897. There was no contract by virtue of these charters that the companies should always and for all time be entitled to all the natural flow of the water in the river without regard to the right of the State as above mentioned. The claim made by the companies seems to us most extravagant. The State or any particular subdivision thereof acting under its authority would, if these claims were valid, be forever thereafter prevented from using any portion of the waters of the river for any public purpose unless compensation for such use were first made these plaintiffs. This construction of the meaning of the charters assumes the power of a territorial or state legislature to bind future legislatures in dealing with these public rights, and it prevents the latter from providing for the use of any portion of the waters for public purposes of the most important character without first making compensation to the plaintiffs for that use. If we should assume the validity of an act of the legislature of such a character, (which, under the decision of this court in Illinois Central Railroad v. Illinois, 146 U. S. 387, is at least doubtful,) it is clear that we ought not to adopt a construction leading to that result unless the legislative act be plain and beyond all doubt. We are of opinion that these particular charters of the plaintiffs are not to be thus construed. The sections of the acts which are material upon this point simply authorize the companies to maintain their dams and sluices, |