Indian Water Rights in Theory and Practice: Navajo Experience in the Colorado River Basin
Citation
Monroe E Price, and Gary D Weatherford, Indian Water Rights in Theory and Practice: Navajo Experience in the Colorado River Basin: .
Summary
Construction of major dam projects in the Western States requires a re-examination of Indian water rights. Roughly analogous to the nineteenth century problem of Indian land rights, the twentieth century issue of Indian water rights has shifted from water ownership to its best use. Conflicts exist between the western water law of prior appropriation and the Indian rights to the water. The United States Supreme Court addressed the issue in Winters v. United States by holding that the Indian rights controlled over state law. However, the standard for measuring the quantity of water reserved to the Indians was not determined, subsequently causing much conflict. Although the Winters doctrine grants rights to the American Indian the extent [...]
Summary
Construction of major dam projects in the Western States requires a re-examination of Indian water rights. Roughly analogous to the nineteenth century problem of Indian land rights, the twentieth century issue of Indian water rights has shifted from water ownership to its best use. Conflicts exist between the western water law of prior appropriation and the Indian rights to the water. The United States Supreme Court addressed the issue in Winters v. United States by holding that the Indian rights controlled over state law. However, the standard for measuring the quantity of water reserved to the Indians was not determined, subsequently causing much conflict. Although the Winters doctrine grants rights to the American Indian the extent to which those rights may be exercised depends upon a number of factors, such as Congressional support, judicial consistency and differing conceptions of reservation purposes and goals. Additionally, Indian interests must be represented before intergovernmental bodies making resource allocation decisions which has not happened in the past. Unless protective action is taken, early-priority Indian water rights may vanish in the face of urban and agricultural development in the West.
Published in Law and Contemporary Problems, volume 40, issue 1, on pages 97 - 131, in 1976.
