Montgomery supreme court
"master"
Attached is the 1831 Ohio Supreme Court decision. Seeley wasn't actually a party---The Cooper heirs sued the state (Micajah T. Williams was the Canal Commissioner responsible for construction of the Miami Canal from Cincinnati to Dayton) because the state had agreed to supply Seely with water from the Mad River Feeder (which fed water from a dam on Mad River just east of today's Findlay Street bridge to the main line of the canal at Sixth Street--this was before the canal was extended north to Piqua). The Coopers had several mills around the head of the canal basin (the general area around the entrance plaza for 5/3 Field) and a saw mill down around Fifth Street, and they had their own dam and race from Mad River, but it was further west (lower down) the river, and they also had the right to take water from the canal for mill power.
Apparently, the state had entered into an agreement with Seely to provide water from the feeder to his "canal" so that he could use it for water power, and the Coopers didn't like that the state was going to take even more water out of Mad River (to supply Seely), possibly affecting the volume that would be available further downstream for their own dam. You also have to wonder if they didn't want to try to stifle competition, since Seely's system would have competed as a source of water power with the Coopers' own right to sell water power (the so-called Upper Cooper Hydraulic) at Fifth Street.
The Supreme Court decided in favor of the state.