Opinion ID: 2612687
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Instream Flows in National Forests

Text: The federal government claims that it has a reserved water right for instream water flows necessary to fulfill national forest purposes. The water court found: (1) that the United States has no instream flow rights for recreational, scenic, and wildlife protection purposes; and (2) that since the United States did not claim any instream flow rights for the Organic Act of 1897 purposes of watershed and timber protection, the court could not award such water rights. We agree with the water court's determinations. The United States Supreme Court expressly found in United States v. New Mexico, supra , that the Organic Act of 1897 does not provide for instream flows for recreational, wildlife, and scenic purposes. Id. at 705, 98 S.Ct. at 3016. The water court decision is in accordance with that interpretation of federal law. The United States has also failed to demonstrate that the instream flow right it claims is necessary to fulfill the national forest purposes. The United States has shown sparse evidence to support its claim that instream flows serve the national forest purposes of watershed and timber protection. [35] It is more likely that Congress did not wish to enlarge the consumption of water arising on national forest lands by protecting minimum instream flows when it established the national forest system in 1897. See Bassman, The 1897 Organic Act: A Historical Perspective, 7 Nat. Resources Law. 503 (1974). The Supreme Court in United States v. New Mexico, supra , emphasized that Congress intended to provide large quantities of water for the economic development of the West when it passed the Organic Act of 1897. Id., 438 U.S. at 711-12, 98 S.Ct. at 3019-20. The national forest purposes in the Organic Act of 1897 are essentially non-consumptive. By the time national forest water is available for appropriation from streams or lakes, it has already serviced most of the national forest purposes. Congress intended that the remaining water was to be used for domestic and commercial purposes as allocated under state law. See, e.g., 16 U.S.C. ง 481 (1976). [36] Congress' goal of enhancing the quantity of water available to western appropriators would be undercut by enlarging federal reserved rights to include minimum instream flows. 438 U.S. at 713, 98 S.Ct. at 3020. Nowhere has the United States shown that without instream flows the purposes of the national forests would be defeated. On the contrary, congressional policies to further the economic development of the West would be frustrated if we were now to hold that the many private appropriators in the national forests must relinquish their long-utilized water rights to downstream appropriators so that the federal government can maintain unneeded minimum stream flows. Many public and private appropriatorsโ cities, industries, farmers, and ranchersโ have depended on water diversions from national forest lands high in the Rocky Mountains. Minimum flow rights would upset these long-held expectations in favor of junior appropriators downstream and outside the national forest reservations. We therefore find that the United States does not have an instream flow claim for reserved water rights in the national forests. [37]