Opinion ID: 2621332
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Prior Appropriation and the Colorado Constitution

Text: As a semi-arid state, Colorado has always faced issues over how to allocate its limited water supply. Early in its history, Colorado implemented a system based upon putting previously unappropriated waters to beneficial use. See, James N. Corbridge, Jr., Historical Water Use and the Protection of Vested Rights: A Challenge for Colorado Water Law, 69 U. Colo. L.Rev. 503, 505 (Spring 1998). The first user to place previously unappropriated water to beneficial use enjoyed a vested water right in the beneficial use of that water, thus giving that senior appropriator priority in use over all subsequent (and therefore junior) appropriators. Id. In 1876, this system of vested water rights arising by virtue of prior appropriation was added to the state constitution: The right to divert unappropriated waters of any natural stream to beneficial uses shall never be denied. Priority of appropriation shall give the better right as between those using the water for the same purpose. . . . Colo. Const. art. XVI, § 6. The constitutional term waters of any natural stream includes both surface water and ground water that is tributary to surface water. See, e.g., Empire Lodge Homeowners' Ass'n v. Moyer, 39 P.3d 1139, 1147 (Colo.2001). This constitutional system is often referred to as prior appropriation, and we use that term in this opinion. In addition to the appropriation of surface streams, Colorado water users rely heavily on appropriations of ground water reserves. Beginning in the 1940s, the amount of ground water appropriation dramatically increased. Conflicts between surface water users and ground water users became common, leading the General Assembly to pass comprehensive legislation in the 1960s. Simpson v. Bijou Irr., 69 P.3d 50, 59 (Colo. 2003).