Wyoming v. Colorado
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''Wyoming v. Colorado'', 259 U.S. 419 (1922) is a set of court cases, all dealing with water distribution from the
Laramie River The Laramie River is a tributary of the North Platte River, approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed March 21, 2011 in the U.S. states of Colorado and Wyoming. ...
. A petition for rehearing was granted, which revised the original decision. A motion to dismiss was later denied.


Background

When a dispute arises between two states, the case is filed for
original jurisdiction In common law legal systems original jurisdiction of a court is the power to hear a case for the first time, as opposed to appellate jurisdiction, when a higher court has the power to review a lower court's decision. India In India, the S ...
with the
United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
. This is one of the very limited circumstances where the court acts with original jurisdiction, e.g. a trial court. In all other cases the Court acts as the highest level appellate court in the United States. The state of
Wyoming Wyoming () is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to the s ...
brought an action against the state of
Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...
to prevent the diversion of a stream system. Wyoming claimed the doctrine of prior appropriation granted them superior
rights Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory ...
to the stream water, as they claimed the water first, and that Colorado's proposed diversion would leave them with an insufficient supply of water.


Opinion of the Court

The Court upheld Wyoming's prior appropriation water rights, preventing Colorado's proposed diversion of the stream system as originally planned. However, the Court allowed Colorado to divert a lesser amount of water, as long as it did not interfere with Wyoming's prior water usage. After in depth fact-finding of the exact amount of water used by Wyoming, the court determined that Colorado could divert no more than per year of water from the interstate stream system.


See also

* '' Arizona v. California''


References


External links

* * United States water case law United States Supreme Court cases United States Supreme Court cases of the Taft Court 1922 in United States case law United States Supreme Court original jurisdiction cases 1922 in Wyoming 1922 in Colorado 1922 in the environment Legal history of Wyoming Legal history of Colorado {{SCOTUS-case-stub