Determination of the Rights of the States of the Lower Colorado River Basin to Waters of the Main Stream of the Colorado River, Opinion

Document: 88th Congress, 1st Session, Senate, Document No. 20, Determination of the Rights of the States of the Lower Colorado River Basin to Waters of the Main Stream of the Colorado River, Opinion of the United States Supreme Court in the Case of State of Arizona, Plaintiff, v. State of California et al, Rendered June 3, 1963, Presented by Mr. Hayden, June 4, 1963, page 5249 ARIZONA v. CALIFORNIA. water necessary to sustain life is to be had, it must come from the Colorado River or its tributaries. It can be said without overstatement that when the Indians were put on these reservations they were not considered to be located in the most desirable area of the Nation. It is impossible to believe that when Congress created the great Colorado River Indian Reservation and when the Executive Department of this Nation created the other reservations they were unaware that most of the lands were of the desert kind-hot, scorching sands-and that water from the river would be essential to the life of the Indian people and to the animals they hunted and the crops they raised. In the debate leading to approval of the first congressional appropriation for irrigation of the Colorado River Indian Reservation, the delegate from the Territory of Arizona made this statement: "Irrigating canals are essential to the prosperity of these Indians. Without water there can be no production, no life; and all they ask of you is to give them a few agricultural implements to enable them to dig an irrigating canal by which their lands may be watered and their fields irrigated, so that they may enjoy the means of existence. You must provide these Indians with the means of subsistence or they will take by robbery from those who have. During the last year I have seen a number of these Indians starved to death for want of food." Cong. Globe, 38th Cong., 2d Sess. 1321 (1865). The question of the Government's implied reservation of water rights upon the creation of an indian Reservation was before this Court in Winters v. United States, 207 U. S. 564, decided in 1908. Much the same argument made to us was made in Winters to persuade the Court to hold that Congress had created an Indian ReservationEpson Perfection 4870 Photo, 400 dpi, 8 bit, 1,765,262 byte