Indian Reserved Water Rights

Burton dissects the irreconcilable conflict of interest within the Interior Department (between the Bureau of Reclamation and the Bureau of Indian Affairs). He also examines the methods of managing disputes in contemporary cases and offers original policy recommendations that include establishing an Indian Water Rights Commission to help with the paradoxical task now facing the federal government--restoring to tribes the water resources it earlier helped give away.

Water conflicts plague every river in the West, with the thorniest dilemmas found in the many basins with Indian reservations and reserved water rightsÑrights usually senior to all others in over-appropriated rivers. Negotiations and litigation over tribal water rights shape the future of both Indian and non-Indian communities throughout the region, and intense competition for limited water supplies has increased pressure to address tribal water claims. Much has been written about Indian water rights; for the many tribal and non-Indian stakeholders who rely upon western water, this book now offers practical guidance on how to negotiate them. By providing a comprehensive synthesis of western water issues, tribal water disputes, and alternative approaches to dispute resolution, it offers a valuable sourcebook for allÑtribal councils, legislators, water professionals, attorneysÑwho need a basic understanding of the complexities of the situation. The book reviews the history, current status, and case law related to western water while revealing strategies for addressing water conflicts among tribes, cities, farms, environmentalists, and public agencies. Drawing insights from the process, structure, and implementation of water rights settlements currently under negotiation or already agreed to, it presents a detailed analysis of how these cases evolve over time. It also provides a wide range of contextual materials, from the nuts and bolts of a Freedom of Information Act request to the hydrology of irrigation. It also includes contributed essays by expert authors on special topics, as well as interviews with key individuals active in water management and tribal water cases. As stakeholders continue to battle over rights to water, this book clearly addresses the place of Native rights in the conflict. Negotiating Tribal Water Rights offers an unsurpassed introduction to the ongoing challenges these claims present to western water management while demonstrating the innovative approaches that states, tribes, and the federal government have taken to fulfill them while mitigating harm to both non-Indians and the environment.

In its 1908 decision for Winters v. United States, the Supreme Court affirmed a lower-court ruling that the United States and the Gros Ventre and Assiniboine Indians had reserved rights to water in the Milk River through an 1888 treaty which created the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation in Montana. Since 1908 the Winters decision, or Indian reserved water rights doctrine, has played an important and controversial role in the West. Indian Reserved Water Rights is the first book-length historical study of the Winters case and the early use of the reserved water doctrine. In the book, John Shurts explains how the litigation and its outcome fit well within the existing legal context and into ongoing efforts at water development in the Milk River Valley. He also examines the life of the Winters Doctrine during its earliest years, primarily through a study of water-rights litigation on the Uintah Reservation in Utah.

In this detailed collection of essays, lawyers, historians, and tribal leaders explore the nuances of the Winters Doctrine.