could authorize if it were ordering an assessment for the first time it equally could authorize, notwithstanding a previous invalid attempt to assess. The previous attempt left the city free "to take such steps as were within its power to take, either under existing statutes, or under any authority that might thereafter be conferred upon it, to make a new assessment upon the plaintiff's abutting property" in any constitutional way. Norwood v. Baker, 172 U. S. 269, 293; McNamee v. Tacoma, 24 Washington, 591; Annie Wright Seminary v. Tacoma, 23 Washington, 109.

We think it unnecessary to consider other questions on the part of the case that we have dealt with. We have said enough in our opinion to show that the enforcement of the assessment lien could not be prevented by the original owner. It is urged, however, that a different rule could be applied in favor of one who purchased the land under the circumstances stated above. But the attempt to liken taxation, whether general or special, to the enforcement of a vendor's lien, and thus to introduce the doctrine concerning bona fide purchasers for value, rests on a fallacy similar to that which we have mentioned above, which would deny the right to tax upon an executed consideration. A man cannot get rid of his liability to a tax by buying without notice. See Tallman v. Janesville, 17 Wisconsin, 71, 76; Cooley, Taxation, 3d ed., 527, 528. Indeed he cannot buy without notice, since the liability is one of the notorious incidents of social life. In this case the road was cut through the plaintiff's land, and, if he had looked, was visible upon the ground. Whether it had been paid for was for him to inquire. The history of what had happened would have suggested that it was not improbable that sooner or later a payment must be made.

Decree reversed.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN and MR. JUSTICE BROWN dissent.

195 U. S.

Argument for Appellant.

THE BLACKHEATH.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA.

No. 34. Argued October 31, 1904.-Decided November 28, 1904.

Admiralty has jurisdiction of a libel in rem against a vessel for the damages caused by its negligently running into a beacon in a channel, although the beacon is attached to the bottom.

THE facts are stated in the opinion.

Mr. Assistant Attorney General McReynolds for the United States, appellant.

Jurisdiction of torts in admiralty depends upon locality— where the cause of action is completed on navigable waters admiralty has jurisdiction, but where it is completed on land the remedy belongs to the courts of common law. The Plymouth, 3 Wall. 20, cited and approved in Ex parte Phanix Insurance Company, 118 U. S. 618; Johnson v. Chicago & Pacific Elevator Co., 119 U. S. 388; Homer Ramsdell Transportation Co. v. La Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, 182 U. S. 406, 411. See The Rock Island Bridge, 6 Wall. 213, 215— a proceeding in rem against a bridge for damage to a ship where jurisdiction was denied.

This court has not attempted to give a general definition of what is land and what is water within the meaning of the admiralty law and the rule adopted in The Plymouth In The Robert W. Parsons, 191 U. S. 17, 33, it was held that repairs to a ship in a dry dock were not made on land.

There are no adjudicated cases involving injury by a ship to a beacon set up in navigable waters. Bridges, piers and wharves which pertain to the land are, in fact, mere extensions of the shore, and therefore torts to them are distinctly different from torts to structures lawfully within navigable

Argument for Appellant.

195 U. S.

waters, and put there solely as aids to navigation. The question now raised was not decided in The Plymouth nor has it been in any other case in this court. But see Hughes on Admiralty, 183; The Arkansas, 17 Fed. Rep. 383, 386; Atlee v. Packet Co., 23 How. 209; The Professor Morse, 23 Fed. Rep. 803; The F. & P. M. No. 2, 33 Fed. Rep. 511, 514; The City of Lincoln, 25 Fed. Rep. 835.

The lower Federal courts have decided a number of cases wherein they undertook to apply the rule laid down in The Plymouth.

The Neil Cochran, Br. Adm. 164, 165; S. C., Fed. Cas. 7996 and 10,087; The Ottawa, Br. Adm. 356; S. C., Fed. Cas. 10,616; The Maud Webster, 8 Ben. 552; Fed. Cas. 9302; The Mary Stewart, 10 Fed. Rep. 137; The City of Milwaukee, 37 Fed. Rep. 705; The H. S. Pickands, 42 Fed. Rep. 239; The Mary Garrett, 63 Fed. Rep. 1011; The Strabo, 90 Fed. Rep. 110; Leathers v. Blessing, 105 U. S. 626; Rundell v. La Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, 100 Fed. Rep. 655; Dailey v. City of New York, 128 Fed. Rep. 799; De Lovio v. Boit, 2 Gall. 398; S. C., Fed. Cas. 3776. And see 6 Rose's Notes, 459, 460.

The opinions of this court discussing the origin, nature and jurisdiction of admiralty courts demonstrate a well defined purpose to construe liberally the terms "all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction" and to ascertain its boundary "by a reasonable and just construction of the words used in the Constitution, taken in connection with the whole instrument and the purposes for which admiralty and maritime jurisdiction were granted to the Federal government." The Steamer St. Lawrence, 1 Black. 522, 527; Ins. Co. v. Dunham, 11 Wall. 1, 22; Waring v. Clarke, 5 How. 440, 450; The Genessee Chief, 12 How. 443; Ex parte Easton, 95 U. S. 68. And see also Benedict's Adm. §§ 151, 161, 172, 175, 191; Crosse v. Diggs, Siderfin, 158; Coke's Inst., Pt. 4, p. 148; Admiralty Act of 1861, 24 Vict. c. 10; Williams and Bruce, Adm. Juris., 3d ed., The beacon was in no proper sense land, nor any part

73.

thereof. It was not connected with the shore, and was not erected for any purpose pertaining to the land. Lights are highly important adjuncts to navigation, and their safety will be better secured by the speedy processes of admiralty courts than by the actions in personam in a court of law. The Gas Float Whitton, 2 L. R. App. Cas. 337, 349.

If in admiralty there is no adequate remedy for injuries to harbor and channel lights by foreign ships, the Government is without power to properly protect and preserve these highly important adjuncts to commerce and navigation:

Mr. Benjamin Carter, with whom Mr. R. H. Clarke was on the brief, for appellee:

A tort, to be a subject of admiralty jurisdiction, must have been consummated, in some navigable area, (1) merely on or in or (2) through action of the water. This proposition is in harmony with the text of all the decisions for the United States Attorney General cited on the Government's brief which cannot be said to impeach it.

Where the wrongful act and its injurious consequences were indistinguishable, with respect to time and place, the inquiry has turned on the mere locality of the act itself. Under this head many of the cases cited fall.

In other cases discussed or cited in the Government's argument the inquiry was whether the injury following on the tortious act was accomplished by supervening action of the water, mechanical or chemical. But see Cope v. Vallette Dry Dock Co., 119 U. S. 625, in which this court held that injury to a dry dock was not cognizable in admiralty.

In the United States admiralty jurisdiction is not derived from any considerations of international or even maritime convenience. It is purely the creature of our Constitution, and so shut off from those accretions which, in view of the policy and institutions of other Christian nations, might be commended. With reference to England, especially, it is clear that, if our admiralty courts have the ancient admiralty juris

diction, they have not that which exists in England today. The Maud Webster, 8 Ben. 552.

MR. JUSTICE HOLMES delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an appeal from the District Court on the question of jurisdiction, which is certified. The case is a libel in rem against a British vessel for the destruction of a beacon, Number 7, Mobile ship-channel lights, caused by the alleged negligent running into the beacon by the vessel. The beacon stood fifteen or twenty feet from the channel of Mobile river, or bay, in water twelve or fifteen feet deep, and was built on piles driven firmly into the bottom. There is no question that it was attached to the realty and that it was a part of it by the ordinary criteria of the common law. On this ground the District Court declined jurisdiction and dismissed the libel. The Blackheath, 122 Fed. Rep. 112.

In The Plymouth, 3 Wall. 20, where a libel was brought by the owners of a wharf burned by a fire negligently started on a vessel, the jurisdiction was denied by this court. See also Ex parte Phoenix Ins. Co., 118 U. S. 610. In two later cases there are dicta denying the jurisdiction equally when a building on shore is damaged by a vessel running into it. Johnson v. Chicago and Pacific Elevator Co., 119 U. S. 388; Homer Ramsdell Transportation Co. v. La Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, 182 U. S. 406, 411. And there are a number of decisions of District and other courts since The Plymouth, which more or less accord with the conclusion of the court below. 62 C. C. A. 287, 290. It would be simple, if simplicity were the only thing to be considered, to confine the admiralty jurisdiction, in respect of damage to property, to damage done to property afloat. That distinction sounds like a logical consequence of the rule determining the admiralty cognizance of torts by place.

On the other hand, it would be a strong thing to say that Congress has no constitutional power to give the admiralty