Judge Turns Down Blm’s Snake River Stock Water Claims

The judge overseeing the adjudication of Snake River water rights has rejected the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s federal claims for stock water, Idaho Attorney General Alan Lance reports.

He called it a major step toward restoring state sovereignty over Idaho’s water. It could save the state and ranchers about $250,000 in legal costs to battle the federal government over the matter.

The BLM claimed it held the rights necessary to water livestock.

“I am astounded by the arrogance of the United States in claiming it owns the water rights that were developed on the sweat of the ranchers,” he said Monday.

Battling the bureau in court was not only industrialist J.R. Simplot, but also some Idaho cattlemen with modest herds who shelled out legal fees to protect their water rights.

The BLM position is that without reserving the water on public land, an individual rancher could control the valuable water source for a large parcel of property.

“This court disagrees,” wrote 5th District Judge Daniel Hurlbutt. “The view that, but for a federal reservation, water on public land may be monopolized assumes no sovereign entity controls or regulates the appropriation from that source.

“This assumption fails because the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the state both controls and regulates the appropriation of all non-navigable water within its borders.”

The adjudication is a lengthy process of determining who is entitled to divert water in the Snake River basin. Of about 175,000 water right claims filed in the adjudication, more than 40,000 of those claims are federal, Lance said.

The BLM filed about 10,000 federal reserved water right claims for water used by stockmen to graze public lands under permits, he said. In many cases, those permits have been held by the same families for decades.

The ranchers developed water rights under state law, which the federal government said it owns because the public lands were withdrawn by executive order.

Hurlbutt’s decision concludes, “The United States’ position … is contrary to law and would effectively shift control over the appropriation of non-navigable waters from the state to the federal government.”

Lance said he is concerned about the legal expense of answering federal demands.