Court Opinion

ID: 9426322
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:17:33.843211+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:55.540216
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Stewart,
with whom Mr. Justice Black-mun and Mr. Justice Stevens concur, dissenting.
The Court says that the United States District Court for the District of Colorado clearly had jurisdiction over this lawsuit. I agree.1 The Court further says that the McCarran Amendment “in no way diminished” the District Court’s jurisdiction. I agree.2 The Court also says that federal courts have a “virtually unflagging obligation ... to exercise the jurisdiction given them.” I agree.3 And finally, the Court says that nothing in the abstention doctrine “in any of its forms” justified the District Court’s dismissal of the Government’s complaint. I agree.4 These views would seem to lead ineluctably to the conclusion that the District Court was wrong in dismissing the complaint. Yet the Court holds that the order of dismissal was “appropriate.” With that conclusion I must respectfully disagree.
*822In holding that the United States shall not be allowed to proceed with its lawsuit, the Court relies principally on cases reflecting the rule that where “control of the property which is the subject of the suit [is necessary] in order to proceed with the cause and to grant the relief sought, the jurisdiction of one court must of necessity yield to that of the other.” Penn General Casualty Co. v. Pennsylvania ex rel. Schnader, 294 U. S. 189, 195. See also Donovan v. City of Dallas, 377 U. S. 408; Princess Lida v. Thompson, 305 U. S. 456; United States v. Bank of New York Co., 296 U. S. 463. But, as those cases make clear, this rule applies only when exclusive control over the subject matter is necessary to effectuate a court’s judgment. 1A J. Moore, Federal Practice ¶ 0.214 (1974). Here the federal court did not need to obtain in rem or. quasi in rem jurisdiction in order to decide the issues before it. The court was asked simply to determine as a matter of federal law whether federal reservations of water rights had occurred, and, if so, the date and scope of the reservations. The District Court could make such a determination without having control of the river.
The rule invoked by the Court thus does not support the conclusion that it reaches. In the Princess Lida case, for example, the reason for the surrender of federal jurisdiction over the administration of a trust was the fact that a state court had already assumed jurisdiction over the trust estate. But the Court in that case recognized that this rationale “ha[d] no application to a case in a federal court... wherein the plaintiff seeks merely an adjudication of his right or his interest as a basis of a claim against a fund in the possession of a state court . . . .” 305 U. S., at 466. The Court stressed that “[n]o question is presented in the federal court as to the right of any person to participate in the res or as to the quantum of his interest in it.” Id., at 467. Similarly, in the *823Bank of New York case, supra, the Court stressed that the “object of the suits is to take the property from the depositaries and from the control of the state court, and to vest the property in the United States . . . 296 U. S., at 478. “The suits are not merely to establish a debt or a right to share in property, and thus to obtain an adjudication which might be had without disturbing the control of the state court.” Ibid.5 See also Markham v. Allen, 326 U. S. 490; United States v. Klein, 303 U. S. 276. See generally 1A J. Moore, Federal Practice ¶ 0.222 (1974); 14 C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice & Procedure §3631, pp. 19-22 (1976).
The precedents cited by the Court thus not only fail to support the Court’s decision in this case, but expressly point in the opposite direction. The present suit, in short, is not analogous to the administration of a trust, but rather to a claim of a “right to participate,” since the United States in this litigation does not ask the court to control the administration of the river, but only to determine its specific rights in the flow of water in the river. This is an almost exact analogue to a suit seeking a determination of rights in the flow of income from a trust.
The Court’s principal reason for deciding to close the doors of the federal courthouse to the United States in this case seems to stem from the view that its decision will avoid piecemeal adjudication of water rights.6 To *824the extent that this view is based on the special considerations governing in rem proceedings, it is without precedential basis, as the decisions discussed above demonstrate. To the extent that the Court’s view is based on the realistic practicalities of this, case, it is simply wrong, because the relegation of the Government to the state courts will not avoid piecemeal litigation.
The Colorado courts are currently engaged in two types of proceedings under the State’s water-rights law. First, they are processing new claims to water based on recent appropriations. Second, they are integrating these new awards of water rights with all past decisions awarding such rights into one all-inclusive tabulation for each water source. The claims of the United States that are involved in this case have not been adjudicated in the past. Yet they do not involve recent appropriations of water. In fact, these claims are wholly dissimilar to normal state water claims, because they are not *825based on actual beneficial use of water but rather on an intention formed at the time the federal land use was established to reserve a certain amount of water to support the federal reservations. The state court will, therefore, have to conduct separate proceedings to determine these claims. And only after the state court adjudicates the claims will they be incorporated into the water source tabulations. If this suit were allowed to proceed in federal court the same procedures would be followed, and the federal court decree would be incorporated into the state tabulation, as other federal court decrees have been incorporated in the past. Thus, the same process will occur regardless of which forum considers these claims. Whether the virtually identical separate proceedings take place in a federal court or a state court, the adjudication of the claims will be neither more nor less “piecemeal.” Essentially the same process will be followed in each instance.7
As the Court says, it is the virtual “unflagging obligation” of a federal court to exercise the jurisdiction that has been conferred upon it. Obedience to that obligation is particularly “appropriate” in this case, for at least two reasons.
First, the issues involved are issues of federal law. A federal court is more likely than a state court to be familiar with federal water law and to have had experience in interpreting the relevant federal statutes, regulations, *826and Indian treaties. Moreover, if tried in a federal court, these issues of federal law will be reviewable in a federal appellate court, whereas federal judicial review of the state courts’ resolution of issues of federal law will be possible only on review by this Court in the exercise of its certiorari jurisdiction.
Second, some of the federal claims in this lawsuit relate to water reserved for Indian reservations. It is not necessary to determine that there is no state-court jurisdiction of these claims to support the proposition that a federal court is a more appropriate forum than a state court for determination of questions of life-and-death importance to Indians. This Court has long recognized that “ '[t]he policy of leaving Indians free from state jurisdiction and control is deeply rooted in the Nation’s history.’ ” McClanahan v. Arizona State Tax Comm’n, 411 U. S. 164, 168, quoting Rice v. Olson, 324 U. S. 786, 789.
The Court says that “[o]nly the clearest of justifications will warrant dismissal” of a lawsuit within the jurisdiction of a federal court. In my opinion there was no justification at all for the District Court’s order of dismissal in this case.
I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

 “Except as otherwise provided by Act of Congress, the district courts shall have original jurisdiction of all civil actions, suits or proceedings commenced by the United States . . . .” 28 U. S. C. § 1345.

 Nothing in the McCarran Amendment or in its legislative history can be read as limiting the jurisdiction of the federal courts. That law operates as no more than a pro tanto waiver of sovereign immunity. United States v. District Court for Eagle County, 401 U. S. 520; United States v. District Court for Water Div. 6, 401 U. S. 527.

 See England v. Medical Examiners, 375 U. S. 411, 415-416; Meredith v. Winter Haven, 320 U. S. 228.

 See ante, at 813-817.

 Donovan v. City of Dallas, 377 U. S. 408, has relevance only insofar as the Court’s opinion there contained a brief summary of the discussion in the Princess Lida case.

 The Court lists four other policy reasons for the “appropriateness” of the District Court’s dismissal of this lawsuit. All of those reasons are insubstantial. First, the fact that no significant proceedings had yet taken place in the federal court at the time of the dismissal means no more than that the federal court was prompt in granting the defendants’ motion to dismiss. At that time, of *824course, no proceedings involving the Government’s claims had taken place in the state court either. Second, the geographic distance of the federal court from the rivers in question is hardly a significant factor in this age of rapid and easy transportation. Since the basic issues here involve the determination of the amount of water the Government intended to reserve rather than the amount it actually appropriated on a given date, there is little likelihood that live testimony by water district residents would be necessary. In any event, the Federal District Court in Colorado is authorized to sit at Durango, the headquarters of Water Division 7. 28 U. S. C. § 85. Third, the Government’s willingness to participate in some of the state proceedings certainly does not mean that it had no right to bring this action, unless the Court has today unearthed a new kind of waiver. Finally, the fact that there were many defendants in the federal suit is hardly relevant. It only indicates that the federal court had all the necessary parties before it in order to issue a decree finally settling the Government’s claims. Indeed, the presence of all interested parties in the federal court made the lawsuit the kind of unified proceeding envisioned by Pacific Live Stock Co. v. Oregon Water Bd., 241 U. S. 440, 447-449.

 It is true, as the Court notes, that the relationship among water rights is interdependent. When water levels in a river are low, junior appropriators may not be able to take any water from the river. The Court is mistaken, however, in suggesting that the determination of a priority is related to the determination of other priorities. When a priority is established, the holder’s right to take a certain amount of water and the seniority (date) of his priority is established. That determination does not affect and is not affected by the establishment of other priorities.