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Opinion of Thomas, J.
such lands and waters, and (2) the right and power to manage, administer, lease, develop, and use the said lands and natural resources all in accordance with applicable State law be, and they are, subject to the provisions hereof, recognized, confirmed, established, and vested in and assigned to the respective States . . . ." § 3(a).
The definition of "lands beneath navigable waters" included those submerged lands under the territorial sea. See § 2(a)(2), 43 U. S. C. § 1301(a)(2). The Act's undertaking to "ves[t] in and assig[n] to" the States the rights to those lands thus conveyed to the States lands that this Court had found in United States v. California to be exclusively federal enclaves. The definition of "lands beneath navigable waters" also included those lands beneath inland waters. See § 2(a)(1) (defining "lands beneath navigable waters" to include "all lands within the boundaries of each of the respective States which are covered by nontidal waters that were navigable" (emphasis added)). Accordingly—and the majority and I agree to this point—coastal States entering the Union after the passage of the Submerged Lands Act gained title to offshore submerged lands and to inland submerged lands through the operation of that statute.
Section 3, which conveyed and confirmed the States' title to submerged lands, was subject to a series of exceptions. As relevant here, § 5 of the Act excepted from § 3's terms "all lands expressly retained by or ceded to the United States when the State entered the Union (otherwise than by a general retention or cession of lands underlying the marginal sea)." § 5(a), 43 U. S. C. § 1313(a) (emphasis added). As to lands beneath the marginal (or territorial) sea, it is undisputed that the "expressly retained" exception sets forth the test for determining whether a withdrawal or reservation of land by the United States is effective in preventing conveyance of title to submerged lands. It seems clear to me that it is also the test for determining whether the United States
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