Arizona republican., 1899-10-12
THE WATER CONTEST
The Hearing of inc Injunction Suits
 Begun.

The hearing of the injunction suits
 against the Maricopa and Salt River Valley Canal companies began in dis
 trict court yesterday morning. The
 first one called was that of J. D. Marian
 vs. the Maricopa Canal company. rep
 resenting one of three classes and diff l fering from the other two in that the | plaintiff did not claim that either he or his predecessors in interest had ap- | propriated water to the lands owned
 by him prior to the construction of the defendants canal. It was merely all leged that in receiving water from the
 defendant he had compiled with all
 reasonable regulations and that the condition imposed by the company making the ownership or rental of a
 water right preliminary to the right to i buy water was not reasonable. The
 question of priority came up later. In
 his argument Judge Kibbey. plaintiff
 for the attorney, pointed out that the
 plaintiff had been receiving water from
 the company for a long period of years
 until the present season, when it was
 denied him on the ground that there
 was water only for holders of shares.
 There had been water in other years
 beyond the needs of the share owners and if there was none now, where had the surplus gone if not to irrigate new lands settled long after the plaintiffs $, which had been in cultivation for seventeen years? Judge Kibbey said he didn't ask of the court a judgment that would work a hardship the company, but he would prevent the company from arbitrarily excluding his client from the purchase of water. There must be, he said, some restraint, otherwise the company could raise it's shares to a fabulous value, as they had been raised this season from $1 to S1.50. Without the restraint he asked for there was nothing to prevent rais- ing them to $1O an inch.
 The only evidence which had been i offered was in support of the allega- tions of the cmoplaint. At the close of Judge Kibbey's argument Attorney ! General Ainsworth, for the companies i moved to dismiss the complaint on the | made by the plaintiff The | motion was denied and MT. AinswOrth | replying, said that the plaintiff had 1 been under no greater hardship this { year than in other years, but had failed ! to comply with a regulation which he had complied with before. MT. Aims ! worth also referred to Judge Kibbey's | famous decision when he was on the : bench in which he had held that hold i CTS of shares should enjoy advantages :. over ordinary users of water. The case was submitted and taken under advisement. It was followed by the 1 Gould case, which differed essentially from the Marian suit in that the plain tiff or his predecessors in interest long before his agreement with the water had appropriated water from the Salt river and conducted it to his land through the old Wilson ditch. He entered into an arrange nent with the company for the deliv- cry of his water and the old ditch fell into disuse and filled up. There were -wo theories regarding the agreement. The plaintiff said that his supply through the Wilson ditch had been cut off by the company's dam. The cO.n- )any said the head of the Wilson iitch lad been washed out by floods, render ng it worthless.
 When court adjourned the case Was lot finished.