135 (and Counting) Cheers for the Original Docket

In skimming through this week's new batch of Supreme Court opinions, including Justice Stevens's latest Rooker-Feldman love-in, I realized, much to my chagrin, that I had overlooked the Supreme Court's last decision in January -- its entry of the decree in the critically important case, Alaska v. United States, No. 128 on the Court's original docket, to those of you keeping score at home... (Keith Olbermann fans know the rest).

Okay, I don't actually mean to suggest that the following is a vital development in American jurisprudence:

As between the State of Alaska and the United States, the United States has title to the marine submerged lands underlying the pockets and enclaves of water at issue in counts I and II of the State of Alaska’s amended complaint, which are those marine submerged lands that are more than three geographical miles from every point on the coastline of the mainland or of any individual island of the Alexander Archipelago.

Still, having just decided to add Chapter III of Hart & Wechsler ("The Original Jurisdiction of the Supreme Court") to my syllabus for Federal Courts next fall, it got me wondering: This side of 1978 -- the last time Congress altered the Court's original jurisdiction -- what are some of the most interesting original jurisdiction cases?

[My favorite is below the fold...]

All things being equal, I think my favorite is Justice Souter's opinion in New Jersey v. New York, No. 120 on the original docket, better known (or, at least, it should be better known) as the "Ellis Island" case. It's the New Yorker in me; I can't help it.

Here's the short summary:

An 1834 compact (hereinafter Compact) between the States of New York and New Jersey provided that Ellis Island, then a modest three acres, was part of New York despite its location on New Jersey's side of the States' common boundary. After 1891, when the United States decided to use the Island to receive immigrants, the National Government began placing fill around its shoreline and over the next 42 years added some 24.5 acres to the area of the original Island. The issue in this case is whether New York or New Jersey has sovereign authority over this filled land. We find that New Jersey does.

My runner-up is Virginia v. Maryland, Chief Justice Rehnquist's fascinating (and yet, non-unanimous) historical examination of the "1785 Compact" concerning the boundary, in the Potomac River, between the two Beltway neighbors.

I know -- this is really dorky. Still, other nominations?