Enterprise Irrigation District v. Farmers Mutual Canal Company

• Decision Date: 06 March 1917
• Docket Number: No. 48,48
• Citation: 61 L.Ed. 644,243 U.S. 157,37 S.Ct. 318
• Parties: ENTERPRISE IRRIGATION DISTRICT et al., Plffs. in Err., v. FARMERS MUTUAL CANAL COMPANY et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

243 U.S. 157

37 S.Ct. 318

61 L.Ed. 644

ENTERPRISE IRRIGATION DISTRICT et al., Plffs. in Err.,

v FARMERS MUTUAL CANAL COMPANY et al.

No. 48.

Argued January 22 and 23, 1917.

Decided March 6, 1917.

Messrs. Harry N. Haynes, Thomas M. Morrow, William Morrow, and Harold D. Roberts for plaintiffs in error.

Messrs. Will R. King, Fred A. Wright, and Carl C. Wright for defendants in error.

Mr. Justice Van Devanter delivered the opinion of the court:

In form this was a suit to determine the relative rights of the parties to divert the waters of the North Platte river, in western Nebraska, for purposes of irrigation; but the only controversy disclosed was over the extent and priority of the right of the Farmers Mutual Canal Company, the principal defendant. Another defendant, the Tri-State Land Company, was interested as a stockholder of the canal company, and need be noticed only in another relation.

The Canal Company claimed a right to divert through its canal 1,142 6/7 cubic feet of water per second of time,—usually spoken of as second feet,—under an appropriation dating from September 16, 1887, and the other parties severally claimed rights to divert specific amounts under later appropriations. In so far as the Canal Company's claim exceeded 28 second feet, with a priority dating from September 16, 1887, it was challenged on the grounds that the appropriation upon which it rested had not been perfected with reasonable diligence; that this was the situation when the appropriations under which the others were claiming were made and perfected; that if the claim subsequently was enlarged it could not, as to the enlargement, take priority over the intervening rights of others, and that if it originally covered 1,142 6/7 second feet, which was disputed, all right to more than 28 feet had been lost by nonuser. But the Canal Company asserted the validity of its entire claim, denied any loss by lack of diligence of nonuser, and contended, among other things, that the State Board of Irrigation had sustained its entire claim in 1897, when the board was engaged under the state law (Laws 1895, chap. 69, §§ 16-27) in adjudicating claims to the waters of the North Platte river, and that the other parties were estopped from questioning its right by reason of their attitude and conduct after 1904, when its predecessor in interest was completing the canal and diverting works at enormous cost. The other parties denied that there was any ground for an estoppel, and insisted that, consistently with the due process and equal protection provisions of the 14th Amendment, the claimed adjudication by the State Board of Irrigation could not be treated as in any way binding upon them, because (a) the law under which the board acted made no provision for notice, and (b) the board had proceeded without notice and without affording an opportunity to be heard. Other contentions were advanced, but no purpose would be served by stating them here.

It was conceded that during portions of the irrigation season the flow of the stream had not been sufficient to satisfy all of these claims, and that the State Board of Irrigation recently had recognized the Canal Company's claim by refusing to restrict its diversion in time of low water to less than 1,142 6/7 second feet.

The cause was submitted on the pleadings and on a 'stipulation of facts' covering 84 printed pages and containing much that was purely evidential, and not in the nature of a statement of ultimate facts.

The stipulation disclosed that the Canal Company's canal was about 80 miles in length, was completed in October, 1910, and was capable of irrigating 80,000 acres; that in 1895 it had cost about $100,000 and was capable of irrigating 30,000 acres; that by reason of financial diffi- culties, a foreclosure suit and other litigation, the work of construction was practically suspended from 1895 to 1905; that the work was actively resumed in 1905 and continued with vigor until October, 1910, when it was completed; that the cost of the work from 1905 to 1910 was in excess of $1,500,000, and more than $950,000 of this was expended before August, 1909, when this suit was begun; that the work done after 1905 included a needledam across the river, costing $27,869.20, an additional headgate of concrete and reinforced steel, costing $52,113.20, and a wastegate or spillway of similar construction, costing $42,253.46; and that the number of acres actually reclaimed and irrigated by the canal was being rapidly increased, being less than 2,000 acres in 1905, and 20,000 acres in 1910.

The trial court held that the canal company's right, although prior in time, did not extend to more than 28.57 second feet of the water, and entered a decree to that effect. An injunction was also granted restraining the company from taking more than was thus accorded to it. In the supreme court the decree was reversed and the suit was dismissed on the merits so far as it concerned the Canal Company and the Tri-State Land Company, and without prejudice in respect of any controversy between the other parties. 92 Neb. 121, 138 N. W. 171.

The supreme court, recognizing that the case was of great importance to the parties and to all who were interested in irrigated lands in the state, and that any decision therein would almost inevitably result in serious loss to one or more of the parties, proceeded in a painstaking way to state, discuss, and determine all the questions presented. Among other things, it sustained the authority of the State Board of Irrigation under the Act of 1895 to adjudicate claims like those to the waters of the North Platte river; described the board's power in that regard as quasi judicial and its adjudications as final un- less appealed from to the district court; held that the right to due notice and a reasonable opportunity to be heard was implied in the act; and reaffirmed its decision in Farmers Canal Co. v. Frank, 72 Neb. 136, 100 N. W. 286, made in 1904, that the board's action upon the Canal Company's claim amounted to an unconditional adjudication of the extent and priority of the claim, and that a leading purpose of the Act of 1895 was to create a state board 'whose records would evidence the priorities of title to the appropriation of water in such a public manner that no one might be misled.'

As respects the notice actually given to the other parties, the opportunity which they had for opposing or contesting the Canal Company's claim before the board, and the knowledge of the board's action which they reasonably should be regarded as possessing, the court found, in substance, that before the board began to inquire into the claims to the waters of the North Platte, it gave due notice of its purpose so to do; that under that notice all the parties to this suit, or their predecessors in interest, appeared before the secretary of the board, at the times and places indicated in the notice, and presented such evidence as they deemed appropriate in support of their respective claims,—the evidence being preserved and becoming a part of the record in that proceeding; that the board's printed rules, which were duly brought to the attention of all the parties, permitted any claimant to contest the claim of another, but no one sought to contest the Canal Company's claim; that in ordinary course, after the evidence was presented, the claims were adjudicated,—a separate opinion upon each claim being prepared by the secretary, who was the state engineer, and afterwards adopted by the board; that each claimant was specially notified of the decision upon his own claim, but not of the decisions upon the claims of others; that the decision upon the Canal Company's claim, in addition to being en- tered in the records of the state board, was shown in a list of established claims regularly appearing in the biennial reports of the board which the state required to be made and published, and was recorded in 1905 in the office of the county clerk of the county where the appropriation was made.

In these circumstances the court concluded that the contention that the board had proceeded without adequate notice to the parties, or without affording them a reasonable opportunity to be heard, had no real foundation. It also concluded that, in view of the nature of the enterprise, the large expenditures required, and the circumstances surrounding the temporary suspension of...