New Hampshire v. Maine
- Decided
- May 29, 2001
- Docket
- 130 ORIG
- Status
- Published
- Jurisdiction
- Federal
Cited 3,343 timesNo negative treatment found in this library
What later courts said
- holding that judicial estoppel may be warranted if, among other things, a party’s later position is “clearly inconsistent” with its earlier position — ProShipLine Inc. v. Aspen Infrastructures Ltd. (2010)
- holding that courts should resist application of judicial estoppel when the prior position was based on inadvertence or mistake — Engines Southwest, Inc. v. Kohler Co. (2008)
- holding that in order to invoke judicial estoppel, "a party's later position must be `clearly inconsistent' with its earlier position" — TiVo, Inc. v. EchoStar Corp. (2010)
Each line is a later court’s own words about this case, not a summary. Read the opinion before relying on it.
How the opinion begins
Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Piscataqua River lies at the southeastern end of New Hampshire’s boundary with Maine. The river begins at the headwaters of Salmon Falls and runs seaward into Portsmouth Harbor (also known as' Piscataqua Harbor). On March 6, 2000, New Hampshire brought this original action against Maine, claiming that the Piscataqua River boundary runs along the Maine shore and that the entire river and all of Portsmouth Harbor belong to New Hampshire. Maine has filed a motion to dismiss on the ground that two prior proceedings — a 1740 boundary determination by King George II and a 1977 consent judgment entered by this Court — definitively fixed the Piscataqua River boundary at the middle of the river’s main channel of navigation.
The 1740 decree located the Piscataqua River boundary at the “Middle of the River.” Because New Hampshire, in the 1977 proceeding, agreed without reservation that the words “Middle of the River” mean the middle of the Pis-cataqua River’s main channel of navigation, we conclude that New Hampshire is estopped from asserting now that the boundary runs along the Maine shore. Accordingly, we grant Maine’s motion to dismiss the complaint.
Cite this
New Hampshire v. Maine, 532 U.S. 742 (2001)Read the full opinion
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