Court Opinion

ID: 9684986
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 14:20:27.353768+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:01.582489
License: Public Domain

McCown, J.,
dissenting.
The majority opinion in this case holds in effect that no watercourse, depression, of drain, part of which is man made, can ever become a “natural” watercourse, depression, or draw within the meaning of Neb. Rev. Stat. §31-201 (Reissue 1978), no matter how long it has been established. Such a watercourse apparently remains an artificial or unnatural watercourse forever.
In view of modern soil and water conservation practices, which constantly affect changes in the course of natural drainage, it seems strange indeed to hold that manmade changes in drainage can never be treated as “natural” for purposes of § 31-201. It seems equally anomalous that granted or prescriptive drainage rights should be confined to *268the purposes supposedly intended by the grantor at the time of the initial acquisition of the right.
In this case there is no dispute but that the plaintiffs or their predecessors granted to the defendants the right to construct a portion of the original watercourse involved in 1952. That watercourse was established and used by the defendants for almost 30 years prior to the institution of this lawsuit. Under the majority opinion that watercourse, although established and continued for that period of time under actual or prescriptive right, can never become a natural watercourse within the meaning of § 31-201.
In my view the judgment of the trial court refusing injunctive relief should have been affirmed.