In the United States v. Louisiana et al., also known as the Alabama and Mississippi Boundary Case, 1984, the Supreme Court was tasked with determining which states owned submerged lands in the Gulf of Mexico. The dispute arose when federal legislation granted coastal states ownership of submerged lands up to three geographical miles from their coastlines but did not specify how to measure this distance for irregularly shaped coasts. The court ruled that a state's coastline should be measured by its general trend rather than its exact shape, meaning that small protrusions or indentations would not affect where the three-mile limit begins. This decision favored Alabama and Mississippi over Louisiana because it meant they had rights over more offshore areas than if each minor change in coastline were taken into account.

In the dissenting opinion for the United States v. Louisiana et al., Justice Stevens argued that the majority's interpretation of the Submerged Lands Act (SLA) was incorrect and inconsistent with its legislative history. He contended that Congress intended to grant coastal states ownership rights only up to three geographical miles from their coastlines, not three marine leagues as interpreted by the majority. According to him, this misinterpretation resulted in an unjustified expansion of state sovereignty over offshore resources at federal government’s expense. Furthermore, he disagreed with how boundaries were drawn between states under this ruling; instead advocating for a more equitable division based on principles established in previous cases involving interstate boundary disputes.