Klamath Irrigation District v. U.S.
| Decision Date | 29 January 2009 |
| Docket Number | SC S056275.,CC No. 2007-5115. |
| Citation | 202 P.3d 159,345 Or. 638 |
| Court | Oregon Supreme Court |
| Parties | KLAMATH IRRIGATION DISTRICT, Tulelake Irrigation District, Klamath Drainage District, Poe Valley Improvement District, Sunnyside Irrigation District, Klamath Basin Improvement District, Klamath Hills District Improvement Co., Midland District Improvement Co., Malin Irrigation District, Enterprise Irrigation District, Pine Grove Irrigation District, Westside Improvement District No. 4, Shasta View Irrigation District, Van Brimmer Ditch Co., Fred A. Robison, Albert J. Robison, Lonny E. Baley, Mark R. Trotman, Baley Trotman Farms, James L. Moore, Cheryl L. Moore, Daniel G. Chin, Deloris D. Chin, Wong Potatoes, Inc., Michael J. Byrne, Daniel W. Byrne, and Byrne Brothers, Plaintiffs, v. UNITED STATES Of America and Pacific Coast Federation Of Fishermen's Associations, Defendants. |
Suzanne Bratis, Assistant U.S. Attorney, filed the response of defendant the United States to the memorandum of law of amicus curiae Oregon Water Resources Department.
Denise G. Fjordbeck, Attorney-in-Charge, Salem, filed the memorandum of law for amicus curiae Oregon Water Resources Department. With her on the memorandum were Hardy Myers, Attorney General, and Mary H. Williams, Solicitor General.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has certified three state law questions to this court. The parties in the underlying federal litigation and the Oregon Water Resources Department, appearing as an amicus curiae in this court, have filed extensive memoranda variously opposing and supporting this court's acceptance of those questions. See ORS 28.200 (); Western Helicopter Services v. Rogerson Aircraft, 311 Or. 361, 364-71, 811 P.2d 627 (1991) (). After considering the parties' arguments, we conclude that it is appropriate to accept the certified questions.
Before turning to the parties' arguments, we first put the three questions that the Federal Circuit has asked in context. The Federal Bureau of Reclamation (the Bureau) manages the Klamath Project, which stores and supplies water to farmers, irrigation districts, and federal wildlife refuges in the Klamath River basin.1 The plaintiffs in the underlying federal litigation are farmers and irrigation districts that use water from the Klamath Project for irrigation and other agricultural purposes. As a result of drought conditions in 2001, the Bureau terminated the delivery of water to plaintiffs in order to make water available for three species of endangered fish.2
Claiming a property right in the water, plaintiffs brought an action in the Court of Federal Claims alleging that the United States had unconstitutionally taken their property. Relying on an Oregon statute, the Court of Federal Claims ruled that plaintiffs had no equitable right in the water that they used to irrigate their land. See Klamath Irrigation District v. United States (Klamath I), 67 Fed Cl 504, 526-27 (2005) (). It followed, the Court of Federal Claims concluded, that plaintiffs' takings claim based on the existence of an equitable interest in the water necessarily failed. See id. at 540 (so concluding).3
Plaintiffs appealed to the Federal Circuit. As the parties framed the issues in the Federal Circuit, the primary issue arose out of an intersection of federal and state law. We begin by briefly describing the federal statute, which provides the context for the state law issue. Congress passed the Reclamation Act of 1902 to provide for the "construction and maintenance of irrigation works * * * for the reclamation of arid and semiarid lands" in the western states and territories. Reclamation Act of 1902, ch. 1093, § 1, 32 Stat. 388. The Act contemplates that, subject to certain conditions, the Secretary of the Interior will make public lands, irrigated pursuant to the Act, available to settlers and also will make water from the irrigation projects available for privately held land. Id. §§ 3-4, 32 Stat. 389. Section 8 of the Act provides that the Act does not affect state laws "relating to the control, appropriation, use, or distribution of water used in irrigation, or any vested right thereunder, and the Secretary of the Interior, in carrying out the provisions of this Act, shall proceed in conformity with such laws." Id. § 8, 32 Stat. 390. Section 8 then adds the following proviso: "[T]he right to the use of water acquired under the provisions of this Act shall be appurtenant to the land irrigated, and beneficial use shall be the basis, the measure, and the limit of the right." Id.
In their briefs to the Federal Circuit, both plaintiffs and the United States explained that section 8 posed a problem for the Secretary in implementing the Act. In most western states, a person may not appropriate water without first putting it to beneficial use. However, the size of many of the federal reclamation projects and the amount of time required to construct those projects prevented the water that those projects were supposed to deliver from being put to beneficial use for many years. The Secretary thus ran the risk that other users would appropriate the water before the Secretary completed the irrigation projects.
In 1905, an official with the United States Geological Survey posted a notice claiming "all the unappropriated waters of the Klamath River * * * to be used for irrigation, domestic, power, mechanical, and other beneficial uses" and stating that the waters "hereby appropriated [are] to be stored by means of a dam located * * * across the Klamath River." Later that year, the Bureau of Reclamation filed a notice with the state engineer stating that "`the United States intends to utilize * * * [a]ll of the waters of the Klamath Basin in Oregon * * *' for purposes of `the operation of works for the utilization of water * * * under the provisions of the * * * Reclamation Act.'" The Bureau later filed plans for the proposed works and proof of authorization of the Klamath Project.
With that statutory background in mind, we turn to the arguments that plaintiffs and the United States raised in the Federal Circuit.4 In their opening brief, plaintiffs assumed that the United States acquired rights to water for use in the Klamath Project when it filed notices with the state in 1905 in compliance with state law. Plaintiffs argued, however, that whatever rights the United States acquired in the water from the Klamath River as a result of its compliance with the 1905 state law, the United States did not hold the exclusive right to use the water. Rather, relying on three United States Supreme Court cases, plaintiffs contended that the farmers and irrigators to whom the United States delivered the water obtained, at a minimum, an equitable interest in the water when they put it to beneficial use. See Nevada v. United States, 463 U.S. 110, 126, 103 S.Ct. 2906, 77 L.Ed.2d 509 (1983) (); Nebraska v. Wyoming, 325 U.S. 589, 613-14, 65 S.Ct. 1332, 89 L.Ed. 1815 (1945) (); Ickes v. Fox, 300 U.S. 82, 94-96, 57 S.Ct. 412, 81 L.Ed. 525 (1937) (same).
Plaintiffs also addressed a state law defense that the United States had asserted (and...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Baley v. United States
...on all of the plaintiffs’ claims. The Oregon Supreme Court accepted the case for certification, Klamath Irrigation Dist. v. United States , 345 Or. 638, 202 P.3d 159, 165 (2009), and on March 11, 2010, the court rendered its decision answering our certified questions. See Klamath Irrigation......
-
Klamath Irrigation Dist. v. United States
...decision on all of plaintiffs' claims. The Oregon Supreme Court accepted the case for certification, Klamath Irrigation Dist. v. United States, 345 Or. 638, 202 P.3d 159 (2009), and on March 11, 2010, the court rendered its decision, answering our certified questions. See Klamath Irrigation......
-
KLAMATH IRRIGATION DIST. v. US
...of Appeals for the Federal Circuit certified three questions to this court, which this court accepted. Klamath Irrigation District v. United States, 345 Or. 638, 202 P.3d 159 (2009). All three questions arise out of a dispute over water rights in the Klamath River basin. Essentially, they a......