## Facts

- The Illinois General Assembly enacted a 1963 statute authorizing the sale to United States Steel Corporation of approximately 194.6 acres of submerged land in Lake Michigan adjacent to Chicago.
- The statute set the purchase price at $19,460 ($100 per acre) and contemplated filling the lakebed for expansion of a steel plant and related facilities.
- The statute asserted the conveyance would advance commerce and industry; proponents cited employment and tax-revenue benefits.
- The State held title to the bed of Lake Michigan subject to a public trust for uses including navigation, commerce, fishing, and public enjoyment of the shoreline.
- After U.S. Steel tendered payment in 1973 and the State Treasurer returned it, the Attorney General filed an action seeking a declaration that the statute was void as an impermissible alienation of public-trust property.
- An earlier taxpayer challenge to the statute had been dismissed for lack of standing without reaching the merits.
- The circuit court declared the statute invalid under the public-trust doctrine; U.S. Steel appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether authorizing conveyance of nearly 195 acres of submerged Lake Michigan lakebed to a private corporation for industrial development violated the public-trust doctrine.
2. Whether asserted public benefits such as jobs, economic growth, and tax revenue could justify a large-scale transfer of public-trust lands into private ownership.
3. Whether the Attorney General had authority to sue to protect public-trust resources, and whether prior taxpayer litigation barred the action.

## Decision

- The Illinois Supreme Court affirmed the circuit court’s judgment.
- The court held the 1963 statute void because it authorized an impermissible abdication of the State’s public-trust responsibilities over submerged lands.
- The court rejected economic-development justifications as insufficient where the conveyance would substantially remove trust property from public use.
- The court held the Attorney General could bring the action to protect public rights in trust lands and that the prior taxpayer suit did not preclude the merits determination.

## Legal Principles

- The State holds beds of navigable waters in trust for the public and may not surrender control in a manner inconsistent with trust purposes.
- Dispositions of trust lands are permissible only when limited in scope and closely connected to trust uses (e.g., improvements related to navigation or access) and when they do not materially impair public interests in the trust resource.
- A substantial, permanent transfer of submerged lakebed into private ownership for primarily private industrial use is presumptively inconsistent with the public trust.
- General claims of employment, tax, or economic benefits do not, by themselves, satisfy the public-trust requirement when the immediate effect is to destroy or greatly impair public interests in the trust property.
- The Attorney General may sue in an official capacity to vindicate public rights in public-trust property; prior litigation dismissed for lack of standing does not bar a later merits challenge brought by the State.

## Conclusion

The Illinois Supreme Court invalidated legislation authorizing sale of a large tract of submerged Lake Michigan land to a private steel company, holding that the public-trust doctrine forbids large-scale alienation of lakebed lands for private industrial purposes and that broad economic benefits cannot justify substantial impairment of public trust resources.


People ex rel. Scott v. Chicago Park District, 66 Ill. 2d 65, 360 N.E.2d 773 (Ill. 1976)