United States v. Parkins

• Decision Date: 11 October 1926
• Docket Number: No. 1556.,1556.
• Citation: 18 F.2d 643
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. PARKINS.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Wyoming

18 F.2d 643 (1926)

UNITED STATES v. PARKINS.

No. 1556.

District Court, D. Wyoming.

October 11, 1926.

Albert D. Walton, U. S. Atty., of Cheyenne, Wyo.

F. A. Michaels, of Lander, Wyo., for defendant.

KENNEDY, District Judge.

This is an action brought by the plaintiff to recover operation and maintenance charges against the defendant upon lands owned by the defendant irrigable under the Wind River irrigation project. It does not seem to be in dispute that the irrigation project was established upon the Shoshone or Wind River Indian reservation for the purpose of irrigating lands therein, and that the acreage, some 106 acres, of defendant's lands are susceptible of irrigation under the project. At least a substantial portion of the lands of the defendant set forth in the petition were at different periods since the beginning of the operation of the project irrigated from the waters of the system.

Under the Act of August 1, 1914 (38 Stat. 582), it is provided that, in connection with the irrigation projects on Indian reservations, the Secretary of the Interior may fix maintenance charges, which shall be paid as he may direct. The lands owned by the defendant are within the reservation and under the irrigation project established by the government, and have been owned by the defendant at all times since the beginning of the operation of the project. For the years 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, 1918, and 1919 the charges fixed by the Interior Department for operation and maintenance were upon the basis of 60 cents per acre, for the years 1920, 1921, 1922, and 1923 the charges were upon the basis of $1 per acre, and for the year 1924 upon the basis of $1.50 per acre, for each and every acre of irrigable land under said project.

Of the amounts so fixed as the operation and maintenance expense and charged against the defendant, he paid the sum of $169.20, and it further appears from the evidence that in the year 1921, on account of the failure on the part of the defendant to pay the operation and maintenance charges, the water was shut off from his land, whereupon the defendant made application for an extension of time to pay such charges then due and owing, admitting that he was indebted to the government for such charge in a sum exceeding $250, which he promised to pay on or before October 1st of that year. He was then given water, but having failed to pay either the back charges or the charges for succeeding years, and having made no application or showing for...