110 BINNEY'S CASE.—2 BLAND.

feet higher be of any injury to it; on the contrary, it must be bene-
ficial; because, instead of giving him the command, as he now
has, of a head of only two feet of water, he will have six feet in
his head race—and so far as the defendants may have a right to
conduct the water, by means of their canal, to mill-sites outside
of, and below that owned by the plaintiff, it will be seen, that
every principle of law, shewn to be applicable, to a natural mill-
site, bears with equal force upon those of the description claimed
by the plaintiff—and, therefore, unless he can shew, that the de-
fendants, as owners of outer mill-sites, have so diverted the water
as to leave not the usual quantity for his use, he has no cause
of complaint. But, that is not alleged or pretended. Therefore,
upon these * grounds, this subject of the plaintiff's com-
122 plaint might be, at once, dismissed as utterly without foun-
dation.

But, the plaintiff contends, that these rights have not only been
reserved to him by this law, but have been secured to him, as
against The Potomac Company, and those claiming under them,
as a monopoly; which, it is alleged, is about to be irreparably de-
preciated or destroyed, by means of the dam proposed to be erected
by the defendants, by enabling them to create mill-sites, which
they may hereafter sell; and cause to be improved, with the
leave, hereafter to be obtained, from the Legislature; or, that by
increasing the volume of water in the canal, they will be enabled
to multiply the number of its wastes, and thereby add to the num-
ber of mill-sites created, in depreciation, and to the ruin of the
plaintiff 's monopoly.

It would seem to be a sufficient answer to this cause of com-
plaint to say, that it is founded upon an assumption, that certain
remote and contingent events are now approaching, and must
happen, in consequence of the erection of this dam by the defend-
ants; but which, it is obvious, may in fact never come to pass, or
certainly not in the injurious manner complained of. The first of
these events, thus referred to, is, that although the defendants
have now no manner of right to create mill-sites, or to use the
water of the canal for any other purposes than navigation; yet,
that, if they are allowed to erect this dam, and prepare for such
an use of its waters, some future Legislature may be induced to
suffer them to do so to the ruin of the plaintiff's rights. This may
happen. But this Court is bound, in due respect to the Legisla-
ture, to presume, that they will, by no act of theirs, authorize,
or sanction injustice, or deprive any one of his property, unless
it be for the public good; nor even then without due compensa-
tion, (h)

(h) The power has been since granted to sell surplus water for mills, &c.
so that such sales do not diminish the water in the bed of the river to the