A great pond in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

is a

pond A pond is an area filled with water, either natural or artificial, that is smaller than a lake. Defining them to be less than in area, less than deep, and with less than 30% emergent vegetation helps in distinguishing their ecology from th ...

lake A lake is an area filled with water, localized in a basin, surrounded by land, and distinct from any river or other outlet that serves to feed or drain the lake. Lakes lie on land and are not part of the ocean, although, like the much large ...

that is held in

trust Trust often refers to: * Trust (social science), confidence in or dependence on a person or quality It may also refer to: Business and law * Trust law, a body of law under which one person holds property for the benefit of another * Trust (bus ...

by the

state State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * ''Our S ...

for public use. Generally, any natural body of water that is larger than in size is public water. In certain

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

states, this legal definition exists at both

common law In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...

and

statutory law Statutory law or statute law is written law passed by a body of legislature. This is opposed to oral or customary law; or regulatory law promulgated by the executive or common law of the judiciary. Statutes may originate with national, state legi ...

History

As is often the case in the United States, the "law of great ponds" descended from early English common law. In 1890, Charles Doe, Chief Justice of the

New Hampshire Supreme Court The New Hampshire Supreme Court is the supreme court of the U. S. state of New Hampshire and sole appellate court of the state. The Supreme Court is seated in the state capital, Concord. The Court is composed of a Chief Justice and four Associate ...

, described the development of the law of great ponds in ''Concord Mfg. Co. v. Robertson'', a case concerning the rights of individuals to cut and remove ice from a pond adjacent to land they had leased, subsequently reducing the flow of water at a downstream mill. The rights of the ice harvesters and mill owners turned on the question of who owned the water in the pond. In the opinion, Chief Justice Doe stated that " de waters and large ponds are public waters. Whatever exceptions, if any, may be found, this is the rule."''Concord Mfg. Co. v. Robertson'', 25 A. 718, 719 (N.H. 1890). The English rule used to distinguish between public and private waters was based on the limit of the tide, for those waters that were navigable were subject to admiralty jurisdiction. In the U.S., this rule had been extended to include navigable fresh water "reasonably capable of valuable use as a public way."''Id.'' at 720. However, it was not always clear that a pond – isolated from the ocean or a navigable river, but otherwise in the public domain – was reserved for public use. Furthermore, the ability to hunt and fish on public lands had been denied to citizens during

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a wa ...

times, and that "system of legal inequality in the enjoyment of public property" was precisely what the colonists sought to avoid.''Id.'' Thus, a new rule defining public waters needed to be established that was not based on the navigability of the waters. From the ''Concord Mfg. Co.'' decision:

Maine

A great pond is defined in

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...

state statute as "any inland body of water which in a natural state has a surface area in excess of 10 acres (40,000 m²) and any inland body of water artificially formed or increased which has a surface area in excess of 30 acres (120,000 m²) except for the purposes of this article, where the artificially formed or increased inland body of water is completely surrounded by land held by a single owner." The term "great pond" originally derives from colonial statutes pre-dating Maine's separation from Massachusetts. Special statutory regulations apply to land adjacent to great ponds for the purposes of shoreland protection and timber harvesting. Maine state law provides for public access to "great ponds."Me. Rev. Stat. Ann. 17, §3860.
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Massachusetts

A great pond is defined in Massachusetts statutes as a

that is in its natural state at least in size. This includes ponds that met the criterion at one time but are now smaller. Massachusetts General Law states that all great ponds must be open for fishing and boating, including providing reasonable access to the pond, except for reservoirs.

New Hampshire

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

, public waters are defined by common law to include all natural ponds of more than . In addition to the common law definition of great ponds, similar definitions can be found in the

New Hampshire Revised Statutes Annotated The New Hampshire Revised Statutes Annotated (RSA) forms the codified law of the state subordinate to the New Hampshire State Constitution. History The RSA is a set of law books published by Thomson West. The work of updating the previous codifi ...

, for example, in th
Wetlands Act, RSA 482-A:21.

References

External links

Official List of Public Waters, N.H. Department of Environmental Services (2007)
{{law Real property law in the United States American legal terminology