Court Opinion

ID: 9512491
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 22:15:41.548373+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:05:24.941403
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE NELSON,
concurring.
¶32 Based on Engel v. Gampp, 2000 MT 17, ¶ 40, 298 Mont. 116, 993 P.2d 701, and the line of authority discussed at ¶¶ 23-26 of today’s Opinion, I concur in the Court’s conclusion that since the Ranch did not prevail on all of the claims it brought under § 70-17-112, MCA, it was not entitled to attorney’s fees as the “prevailing party” in this litigation pursuant to § 70-17-112(5), MCA. That is the current state of the law.
¶33 That said, if the Ranch views our decision here as adding insult to its injury, I can certainly commiserate with that sentiment. The Ranch did prevail on its main claim under the statute-forcing Joukova to remove her culvert and rock bridge which she had unlawfully constructed in the Ranch’s irrigation ditch.
¶34 In Musselshell Ranch I, I strongly criticized and dissented from this Court’s determination to judicially rewrite § 70-17-112(2), MCA, so as to add, among other things, this Court’s own “public policy” determinations to the otherwise plain and unambiguous text of the statute. Musselshell Ranch I, ¶¶ 75-77, 81 (Nelson, J., concurring in the result but dissenting from the reasoning). I pointed out that this Court’s decision placed irrigators in an untenable position. I observed that “[t]here is no reason, much less any legal basis, why owners of *345canal or ditch easements should have to defend, as they henceforth must, their statutory easement rights from the ‘interference’ (reasonable or otherwise) of every hobby rancher with 20 acres and a horse.” Musselshell Ranch I, ¶ 82 (Nelson, J., dissenting).
¶35 If irrigators expect to retain the full measure of the ditch and canal rights they once enjoyed, it will be up to the next session of the Legislature to amend § 70-17-112, MCA, so as to correct the damage to the statute done by this Court’s judicial rewriting of it. See Musselshell Ranch I, ¶ 85 (Nelson, J., dissenting). And, lest the importance of amending the statute be lost on irrigators, they should keep in mind that this Court also took the position in Musselshell Ranch I that if the Legislature does nothing this next session to fix § 70-17-112, MCA, then this Court will “presume” that the Legislature agrees with our decision to rewrite the statute. See Musselshell Ranch I, ¶ 14 (Court’s opinion), ¶¶ 53-59 (Nelson, J., dissenting).
¶36 Finally, in amending § 70-17-112, MCA, the Legislature may also wish to include a revised attorney’s fees provision in the statute. In future cases, where the irrigator successfully litigates an unlawful encroachment upon or impairment to its ditch or canal rights, the irrigator should be awarded its costs and reasonable attorney’s fees for prevailing on its main claim under the statute.
¶37 With these caveats, I concur.