The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1920-06-10
two or more offices within each

two or more offices within each
county.
Even these scattered records are
incomplete, because the present irri-
cation law does not make it obliga-
tory to file any record at all. There
are under the present laws three diff
ferent methods of procedure for the
initiation of water rights-by benefit
cial use without any record whatever,
by posting and filing notice of appro-
priation, or by applying to the court
for supplemental rights on streams
that have been already decreed. This
is another evident cause of confusion
and should be remedied by reducing
all water appropriations to one sys-
tenn, as is done in most other states.
On most of the streams of this
state, the recorded appropriations
amount to several times the supply
of water actually available, and as
there is NO provision made for keep
ing the records up to date by the eli
mination of abandoned and forfeited
rights, the records are of little value
and are often misleading and worse
than useless. Under the irrigation
laws of Wyoming and other states,
the records of one central office show
all valid water rights up to date for
each stream of the state.
The Montana system makes it the
duty of every water user to defend
his right as against other users, and
provides for no official administra-
ton of the waters of the state. When
trouble arises it is up to the water
user to fight out his own case, either
in the field or in court, always at
great loss and expense, and when
adjudication by court is finally ac-
compished, the matter is still unset
tied and always be again renewed and
thrown into court, so that no water
user is ever certain of his rights, or
ever free from the necessity of go
ing to further trouble and expense
to protect himself.
1t is generally assured that a de-
cree of court gives some sort of Sc
curity to water title. This however
is often only a delusion, in the light
of actual facts and statistics. On
many streams of the state, court de-
crees have been entered for several
times the available water supply of
liz 0S1OdlI1g III O1ICh " Hull WoICl /
than can be beneficially used. Cases
are known where years and years of
costly litigation has finally re-
suited in DEGREES no more satisfac-
tory to the farmers than the original
conditions that started the trouble. A
cas- recently came to light where the
rights to a certain stream were bit
terly fought out through three courts
and decree finally entered before it
was discovered that the same case
had been previously tried and de-
creed and the records thereof so we'll
filed away among the dusty archives
of the court house that they were
wholly forgotten and ignored in the
trial of the case.
The unsatisfactory condition as to
court DEGREES in this state arises
from two principal causes; in the
first place, the difficulty in getting
before the court the actual and scien-
tific facts on which to base a proper
decision, and in the second place, the
still more vital fact that the average
district judge cannot be expected to
be sufficiently familiar with the real
science of water distribution and use
to make a competent decision in
questions that ought to be settled by
irrigation experts
The only satisfactory cure for the
bad situation above outlined is a
complete change in the fundamental
system by which the waters shall be
administered and adiudicated by a
board of irrigation experts, and all