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<br />lands bordering on a stream, to the continued flow of its waters; so far at least as may <br /> <br />be necessary for the beneficial uses of the government property. . . ."3/ It <br /> <br />acknowledged that such "specific authority" had been conferred on the western states <br /> <br />by the Desert Land Act of 1877, which provided that "the water of all lakes, rivers <br /> <br />and other sources of water supply upon the public lands and not navigable, shall <br /> <br />remain and be held free for the appropriation and use of the public for irrigation, <br /> <br />mining and manufacturing purposes subject to existing rights" under state law. <br /> <br />However, as in Martin, supra, it held that the jurisdiction conferred on the western <br /> <br />states to allocate use rights in such waters remained subject to the "superior power of <br /> <br />the general government to secure the uninterrupted navigability of all navigable <br /> <br />streams." 4/ <br /> <br />Water resources development in the West was initially a matter almost solely <br /> <br />of private initiative, just as it had been in the East, but the magnitude of the <br /> <br />investment needed to develop such resources led to federal assumption of the <br /> <br />responsibility for providing water storage and distribution facilities for irrigation <br /> <br />throughout the West in the Reclamation Act of 1902.5/ <br /> <br />3/ United States v. Rio Grande Dam & lrr. Co., 174 U.S. 690, 703 (1899). <br /> <br />4/ ld. at 703. The history of the Congressional severance of federal land and water <br />interests in the West is reviewed in California Oregon Power Co. v. Beaver Portland <br />Cement Co., 295 U.S. 142 (1935). <br /> <br />5/ For the history of the development of the federal reclamation program, see California v. United <br />States, 438 U.S. 645 (1978). <br /> <br />2 <br />