Laserfiche WebLink
<br />35 <br /> <br />But in an important sense, Reynolds. himself was the author of Jones's worry. And <br /> <br />why did Larry Davis tell the Tribal Council that Congress would probably not pass <br /> <br /> <br />the NIIP bill without a shortage-sharing provision? The implication is that important <br /> <br /> <br />interests other than the Navajo favored equalizing priorities on the river. Rio Grande <br /> <br /> <br />interests, for example, would benefit from Navajo relinquishment of first priority. This <br /> <br /> <br />spin on the history of the shortage-sharing provision turns it very much into a <br /> <br /> <br />situation in which the Navajo are told that they have to limit their water claims to <br /> <br /> <br />NIIP because additional water, beyond NIIP, is not theirs. But this situation begs the <br /> <br />question of Navajo quantification, saying that it happened because there was no other <br />water for the tribe.91 <br /> <br />Thus the conclusion that the shortage-sharing provision quantifies Navajo Winters <br /> <br /> <br />rights stumbles against two obstacles: the wide reference to state law and surrounding <br /> <br /> <br />facts and circumstances required to reach the conclusion and New Mexico's control of <br /> <br />that law and those facts and circumstances. Several other obstacles stand in the way <br /> <br /> <br />of the conclusion that any provision of NIIP's authorizing legislation quantified Navajo <br /> <br /> <br />Winters rights. Those obstacles are that Congress did not, as required by Dim1 <br /> <br /> <br />appreciate the conflict between existing Navajo rights and quantification; that in 1962, <br /> <br /> <br />Congress could not have formed the intent to quantify Winters rights; that the NIIP <br /> <br /> <br />record is peppered with statements of concern that Navajo rights be protected; that <br /> <br />9lIn fact, it is arguable that any uses of water on the San Juan other than NIIP <br />(and San Juan-Chama, to which the tribe clearly consented) were illegal usurpations of <br />Navajo rights. <br />