Court Opinion

ID: 9426323
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:17:33.846053+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:00.224115
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Stevens,
dissenting.
While I join Mr. Justice Stewart’s dissenting opinion, I add three brief comments:
First, I find the holding that the United States may not litigate a federal claim in a federal court having jurisdiction thereof particularly anomalous. I could not join such a disposition unless commanded to do so by an unambiguous statutory mandate or by some other clearly identifiable and applicable rule of law. The McCarran Amendment to the Department of Justice Appropriation *827Act of 1953, 66 Stat. 560, 43 U. S. C. § 666, announces no such rule.
Second, the Federal Government surely has no lesser right of access to the federal forum than does a private litigant, such as an Indian asserting his own claim. If this be so, today’s holding will necessarily restrict the access to federal court of private plaintiffs asserting water rights claims in Colorado. This is a rather surprising byproduct of the MeCarran Amendment; for there is no basis for concluding that Congress intended that Amendment to impair the private citizen’s right to assert a federal claim in a federal court.
Third, even on the Court’s assumption that this case should be decided by balancing the factors weighing for and against the exercise of federal jurisdiction, I believe we should defer to the judgment of the Court of Appeals rather than evaluate those factors in the first instance ourselves. In this case the District Court erroneously dismissed the complaint on abstention grounds and the Court of Appeals found no reason why the litigation should not go forward in a federal court. Facts such as the number of parties, the distance between the courthouse and the water in dispute, and the character of the Colorado proceedings are matters which the Court of Appeals sitting in Denver is just as able to evaluate as are we.
Although I agree with Parts I, II, III-A, and III-B of the opinion of the Court, I respectfully dissent from the decision to reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.