The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-08-11
kansas-COlOrado Irrigation Suit
Takes New Turn.
Big Ditch Companies Are Made
Parties to suit.
MR.. TELLER is SCARED.
Senator Thinks That Kansas
Will Win.
Talks of Legislation to Help
Out.

Kansas in the KanSaS-ColOrado litiga-
ton went to the state printer today and
will be ready for forwarding to Wash
ington tomorrow. Kansas has until next
Saturday to file it in the United States
supreme court.
The chief feature of the amended pc
tition is that it makes a lot of the big
ditch and irrigating companies of Col
OradO co-defendants with the state of
Colorado in the suit. There are perhaps
several hundred of these companies in
the state. but as it would be impractical
Bile to make them all defendants, and as
it will not be necessary, only a few of
| the larger ones are named. Senator
Fred Dumont Smith and S S. Ashbaugn
of Wichita, two of the attorneys on the
part of Kansas, have recently returned
from Colorado where they have been
gathering data for use in making up
this amended petition. All the attorneys
in the case are here today. The others
are N H LOOMS and Attorney General
Coleman
The largest of these companies which
are made defendants in this suit is the
Colorado Fuel & Iron company, which
is an octopus in itself. 1t has a capital
of S25.OOO,OOO. The others are:
The Bessemer Ditch company.
The Oxford Farmers Ditch company.
The Otero Canal company.
The Lake Canal company.
The Riverside Ditch company.
| The Catlin Consolidated Ditch COM
pany.
The Graham Ditch company.
The Lamar Land and Canal company.
! The Amity Canal and Reservoir COM
pany.
! The Rocky Ford Canal. Reservoir, Land,
Loan & Trust company.
The Fort Lyon Canal company.
! The Colorado Land & Canal company.
The Great Plains Water company.
! The Arkansas Valley Sugar Beet &
Irrigated Land company.
The Bent-Otero improvement COM
pany.
pany
IF we win this suit it will have two
results said Senator Smith today. 1t
will mean that Colorado will have to let
the natural supply of water, as shown
by the government gauges, come into
Kansas in the Arkansas. That will
compel these Colorado companies, if
they want to irrigate, as they must, to
build reservoirs in order to store the
/ flood waters. We don't want the flood
waters, so that will help us to get rid
of them, and it will aid US to get
steady flow all the year around. l don't
think the people of Kansas have ever
properly appreciated this suit or what
! it means to the state"
Senator Teller of Colorado believes
that Kansas is going to win the suit
in the United States supreme court, and
he is getting worked up about it. He
expects the subject to get into congress
in some form and is preparing data for
his own use in the senate in that event.
I In an interview in the Denver papers
he said:
CsnnHroT he oh 10
to handle this case sfngle-handed, but 1
doubt it. Even with the best assistance
he could employ Colorado will have all
she can do to protect herself in this
case The case as it stands now is
against us. l have the gravest appre-
| tensions about our being able to win
the suit even under the most favorab BILE
conditions. The trend of the United
States court and its decisions are all
against US. All of us who were inter
ested in the case were certain that the
supreme court would sustain our de-
murrer and throw the Kansas people
out of court but much to our conster-
nation the demurrer was overruled and
we were ordered to answer
The supreme court in the case of
New Mexico and the waters of the Rio
Grande river, which case was anal
oSous to this gave an opinion or ruling
which would seem to indicate very
clearly that the court will be against
Colorado in this present suit. 1t is
plainly the intention of the government
! to assume control of irrigation through
out the country. We have always con-
tended, and it has never before been
disputed, that the states had control of
their non-navigable streams, but it
looks as if the government were going
to assume control of them also, on the
broad theory that anything that affects
their tributaries affects also the naviga-
BILE streams. This would take control
of it's waters out of the hands of the
state entirely, and destroy our irriga-
ton enterprise. In fact, Justice Brewer,
when he was here a month or so ago,
was quoted as saying that the govern
ment would have to assume jurisdic-
ton over the irrigation question in the
west.
What we would do if Kansas should
win this suit, I don't know Nothing
can be done in congress to remedy the
matter for it is one of the contentious
in Kansas suit that congress has no
power in the premises, Kansas having
become possessed of the riparian rights
told that if Kansas wins her suit she
will call upon the United States army to
enforce her rights under the decision,
and then all irrigation would have to
cease in Colorado. Such a calamity
would be of untold consequences to this
state. If Kansas is entitled to the
waters of the eastern watershed, New
Mexico would be entitled to those of the
]
ing states would all come into Colorado
for this water. many of the largest
streams having their rise in this state"
1t is not likely that the case will come
up in the United States supreme court
for final argument for more than year.
Attorney General Coleman says it is i'm
possible to tell anything about that, as
it will lie largely with the defendants
and with the court.
Kansas will file its amended petition
on SATURDAY. and the new defendants
will then have so days, or until about
October u. in which to file demurrers.
If demurrers are filed they will then
have to be argued The state of Color
ado has already demurred but was
beaten on the demurrer. Mr.. Coleman
says the defendants would then perhaps
be given until April to file their answers
and after that would come the taking