Opinion ID: 613271
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The District Court and the Parties' Arguments on the Compact and Consent

Text: Before conducting our own consent analysis, we review the district court's and the parties' interpretations of the Compact. The district court explained that [t]he language of the RRC does not explicitly say `states can limit or stop the out-of-state shipment of water' nor does it make any explicit reference to the Commerce Clause, dormant or otherwise. But the court does not read the various cases to require that level of specificity. Tarrant I, 2009 WL 3922803 at . The district court then turned to the specific Compact provisions, noting that the Compact said it govern[ed] the use, control and distribution of the interstate water and provide[d] an equitable apportionment of that water. Id. (quoting the Compact, §§ 1.01(a), 1.01(b), 94 Stat. 3305). The court also pointed to Compact language stating that the Signatory States may use the water allocated to it by this Compact in any manner deemed beneficial by that state, that a state's failure ... to use any portion of the water allocated to it shall not constitute relinquishment or forfeiture of the right to such use, and that nothing in the Compact shall interfere or impair the right or power of any Signatory State to regulate within its boundaries the appropriation, use, and control of water... not inconsistent with its obligations under this Compact. Id. (quoting §§ 2.01, 2.04, 2.10). The court also emphasized that many of the provisions that apportion water say that the pertinent state `shall have free and unrestricted use.' Id. (using as examples §§ 4.02(b), 4.03(b)). The district court concluded that [t]he principal purpose and effect of the [Compact] was to protect state water resources: [N]one of the many cases concluding Congress' intent to supplant the Commerce Clause was insufficiently clear or insufficiently expressed involved circumstances where the essence of what Congress did do was to allocate resources between states. Id. at . Tarrant argues on appeal that the Supreme Court has set a high standard for finding congressional consent and quotes the expressly stated and unmistakably clear language from Wunnicke. Tarrant contends that the Compact's language giving Oklahoma free and unrestricted use to water in Reach I, Subbasin 2  which covers the location of its Beaver Creek and Cache Creek applications  merely gives Oklahoma a perpetual preference for the use of [that] water and discharges Oklahoma from any obligation to guarantee a downstream delivery. Aplt. Opening Br. at 43. Tarrant claims that the Oklahoma statutes exceed the scope of any congressional consent to discriminate and that the statutes were not enacted pursuant to any compact. Id. at 44, 45. OWRB emphasizes the Compact's language granting to Oklahoma free and unrestricted use of the water in the relevant subbasins. OWRB also argues that compacts are inherently protectionist, noting that when a state enters into an interstate water compact, it always does so in order to promote and protect the use of water within its own boundaries. Aple. Reply Br. at 52. The reason Congress is even required to consent to Compacts, the OWRB claims, is that compacts allocate water to states so that they may protect their shares. Id. at 53.