Opinion ID: 1182352
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Cases decided after January 1, 1893

Text: A brief review of the cases decided by this court on the subject of water transferability since Peck will highlight the incorrectness of McBryde I. Lonoaea v. Wailuku Sugar Co., 9 Haw. 651 (1895) involved the question of the transferability of water from a river to kula land within the same watershed. The court held: We find no objection either in law or reason to allowing the owner of land which is entitled to water from transferring the same amount of water to other land providing he thereby works no injury to others. Id. at 665. This holding was reiterated on similar facts in Horner v. Kumuliili, 10 Haw. 174 (1895). In Wong Leong v. Irwin, 10 Haw. 265 (1896), the defendant had diverted water from one watershed to kula land in another watershed. The court held specifically that the owner of land with the appurtenant or prescriptive right to water could transfer that water to any other land, whether in the same watershed or in another watershed, so long as the water rights of others were not thereby compromised. Id. at 270-272. The same reasoning was followed in Palolo Land & Improvement Co. v. Wong Quai, 15 Haw. 554 (1903), although that case involved the transfer of water to land in a single watershed. The next case in sequence of time was Carter v. Territory, 24 Haw. 47 (1917). Carter dealt with a controversy between konohikis of two ahupuaas over storm and freshet surplus water which on occasion ran in a stream passing through both ahupuaas. The court held that the konohikis must share these storm and freshet waters according to the principles of common law riparianism. Although the reasoning of the Carter court is highly unsatisfactory in this regard, the result is nonetheless defensible on the ground that in ancient times the Hawaiians rarely availed themselves of storm precipitation and that therefore no Hawaiian usage under HRS ง 1-1 existed to supplant common law riparianism as to this class of water. McBryde Sugar Co. v. Robinson, supra 54 Haw. at 205-206, 504 P.2d at 1348 (Marumoto, J., concurring and dissenting); see Hutchins 94. Regardless of the wisdom of Carter in terms of overall water policy, see id. at 94-98, its impact is probably not of great practical importance in Hawaii, where the characteristic drainage areas are short and steep, where the flood waters of many streams come down in great quantities and flow for brief periods, and where practicable means of storing large quantities of flood water are not available. Id. at 95. Moreover, the holding of Carter has acquired over the course of more than half a century a special force as a rule of property law which is long established and conformed to and which therefore should not be overturned by this court. In re Austin, 33 Haw. 832, 839 (1936); see note 20 supra. The decision in McBryde I to overrule this aspect of Carter does violence to this basic principle of stare decisis. The limited scope of the riparian doctrine announced in Carter was soon accentuated in Foster v. Waiahole Water Co., 25 Haw. 726, 733-735 (1921), which held that normal surplus water was never appurtenant to any particular parcel of an ahupuaa or ili kupono and that it was freely conveyable by the konohiki apart from its land of origin. Cf. In re Taxes Waiahole Water Co., 21 Haw. 679 (1913). Finally, Territory v. Gay, 31 Haw. 376 (1930) applied Wong Leong v. Irwin, supra , to normal surplus water and held that the konohiki of the ahupuaa or ili kupono on which such water arose could transport it wherever he wished, including to kula land in an entirely different watershed. In doing so, a divided court expressly rejected riparianism as applied to any other class of water than the storm and freshet surplus dealt with in Carter. See note 19 supra. As Mr. Chief Justice Perry indicated: While it is, perhaps, technically true that, as stated in the Carter case, private water rights in Hawaii are governed by the principles of the common law of England except so far as they have been modified by or are inconsistent with Hawaiian statutes, custom or judicial precedent, that statement is of very little, if any, consequence or significance in view of the widely prevailing Hawaiian customs and the judicial precedents long since established with reference to water rights in this Territory. Our system of water rights is based upon and is the outgrowth of ancient Hawaiian customs and the methods of Hawaiians in dealing with the subject of water. No modifications of that system have been engrafted upon it by the application of any principles of the common law of England. 31 Haw. at 394-395. In my opinion, the foregoing statement correctly articulates the relationship between Hawaiian water law and common law riparianism except in the limited circumstances of the Carter case, and therefore the court should adhere to it in lieu of the analysis of the subject contained in McBryde I.