All streams which have been rendered or can be rendered capable of being navigated by rafts of lumber or timber by the removal of accidental obstructions and all navigable watercourses and cuts are hereby declared navigable streams and such streams shall be common highways and forever free, as well to the inhabitants of this State as to citizens of the United States, without any tax or impost therefor, unless such tax or impost be expressly provided for by the General Assembly. If any person shall obstruct any such stream, otherwise than as in Chapters 1 to 9 of this Title provided, such person shall be guilty of a nuisance and such obstruction may be abated as other public nuisances are by law.
S.C. Code Ann. § 49-1-10
Navigable streams considered common highways; obstruction as nuisance
Applied in 6 court decisions — leading case Overcash v. South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. (2005)
Most recently applied in Brownlee v. South Carolina Department of Health & Environmental Control (March 2009)
1962 Code SECTION 70-1; 1952 Code SECTION 70-1; 1942 Code SECTION 5807; 1932 Code SECTION 5807; Civ
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: South Carolina Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain South Carolina statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.