4 ms·

If I own a house adjacent to the river, and the river floods my property, can I sue the river?

egypturnash 8y ago
If you built on a floodplain then there may be an argument that you are trespassing on land that rightly belongs to the river. The river’s wanderings built that land and I doubt you or anyone who previously owned that property ever negotiated with the river for it. And I am saying this as someone in the middle of moving to New Orleans, a place humanity has been fighting with a river over for three centuries now. Someday the Mississippi will assert its claim forcefully. And New Orleanians will probably just shrug and either build up houses that sit next to canals instead of streets, or learn to grow gills. New Venice or New Atlantis.
- khawkins 8y ago
  You speak like an authoritarian, giddy at the thought of having nearly limitless capacity for activist judges to wield the justice system according to their whims. Nearly every piece of land on the planet is within the basin of a regional river. We have regulations and laws so that people know what is okay and what isn't. Our understanding of what has significant impacts on rivers and what doesn't changes frequently. Our notions of what a "significant impact" is on the river change with cultural norms. But under your system, activists merely need to seek the most sympathetic judge and punish nearly anyone they please in a kangaroo court. We have plenty of laws which punish environmental damage, regulations that provide a standard of care to avoid damage, and systems for enacting new laws and regulations. Use those systems if you want to protect the environment.
  - egypturnash 8y ago
    > nearly limitless capacity for activist judges to wield the justice system according to their whims. It'd be a nice change from activist judges who take the side of the corporations.
roywiggins 8y ago
The US government has sued land (and won): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._50_Acres_of_Land https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._50_Acres_of_L... People have sued God (and lost): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawsuits_against_God https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawsuits_against_God People have sued search warrants (and won): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_v._Search_Warrant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_v._Search_Warrant So you probably can! But, lacking a fixed address or any way to notify the defendant, you'd probably have the case thrown out. Also, enforcing any judgement would probably be impossible, so there's that. The moral of the story is that courts have lots of ways to deal with situations like this.

If you built on a floodplain then there may be an argument that you are trespassing on land that rightly belongs to the river. The river’s wanderings built that land and I doubt you or anyone who previously owned that property ever negotiated with the river for it. And I am saying this as someone in the middle of moving to New Orleans, a place humanity has been fighting with a river over for three centuries now. Someday the Mississippi will assert its claim forcefully. And New Orleanians will probably just shrug and either build up houses that sit next to canals instead of streets, or learn to grow gills. New Venice or New Atlantis.

khawkins 8y ago
You speak like an authoritarian, giddy at the thought of having nearly limitless capacity for activist judges to wield the justice system according to their whims. Nearly every piece of land on the planet is within the basin of a regional river. We have regulations and laws so that people know what is okay and what isn't. Our understanding of what has significant impacts on rivers and what doesn't changes frequently. Our notions of what a "significant impact" is on the river change with cultural norms. But under your system, activists merely need to seek the most sympathetic judge and punish nearly anyone they please in a kangaroo court. We have plenty of laws which punish environmental damage, regulations that provide a standard of care to avoid damage, and systems for enacting new laws and regulations. Use those systems if you want to protect the environment.
- egypturnash 8y ago
  > nearly limitless capacity for activist judges to wield the justice system according to their whims. It'd be a nice change from activist judges who take the side of the corporations.

roywiggins 8y ago

The US government has sued land (and won): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._50_Acres_of_Land https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._50_Acres_of_L... People have sued God (and lost): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawsuits_against_God https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawsuits_against_God People have sued search warrants (and won): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_v._Search_Warrant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_v._Search_Warrant So you probably can! But, lacking a fixed address or any way to notify the defendant, you'd probably have the case thrown out. Also, enforcing any judgement would probably be impossible, so there's that. The moral of the story is that courts have lots of ways to deal with situations like this.