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. ' . -I 00la8~ Assuming, without deciding, that the statute is in torce, that the legislature was not prohibited by the Constitution trom passing it with the words "there- ai'ter" inserted, and that such is its proper interpretation, we must next determine whether the word "only" should be read into it. All the arguments asSUlllll that the aot means just what it would if that word were inserted. lIe think a careful reading of it will show the error cf toot assumption. As the act stands it is a grant. with that wcrd inserted it is a prohibition. In territcrial days. and during the first three years of statehood. reservoirs were built. and others oculd have been. Assuming the Constitution left the General Assembly fioee to fcrbid reservoirs taking, under senior appro- priations, water thereafter needed by ditohes for direct irrigation under junior appropriations, no such aot had been passed. In its absence. .doubtless. such reservoirs and ditches stood upon an absolute equality. Priority of appropriation and useful application alone oontrolled. .Then a reservoir made its appropriation it was unqualified by any contingent needs of junior ditohes for water for direot irrigation in the future. "First in tiIna first in right" ruled. The senior reservoir oould not only take and store water "not then" needed for immediate use for irrigation. but also water "not thereafter" so needed and "thereal'ter" so needed. This conolusion not Only appeals to us as correct; it is assUlJled in all the arguments here made. Then CMfJ the Act 01' 1879 whioh gave the reservoir the right (if we interpret statute and Constitution as defendants contend) to take and store ''water not thereai'ter needed" for direct irrigation. The right thus purportedly granted was but a part of a righi; already existing. How then did it prohibit diversion by the reservoirs of water thereafter needed for direct irrigation? Only, it seems to us, by impli- cation, and that by invoking the maxim, "The e:xpression of one is the exolusicn of ancther." But the maxim is not applicable to a statute merely affirming existing law. City cf Lexingtcn v. Commeroial Bank. 1;0 Mo. App. 687, 692. 108 S. w. 1095. In the interpretation of a contract we have said. in substance. that where a right exists it is not strengthened by repetition. nor is it revcked by failure to repeat. The maxim does not apply in such oases. Loveland v. Clark, 11 Colo. 265. 269. 18 Pac. 544. It follows that the lIlllXim may never bEl resorted to in denial of' existing rights by invoking its aid in the inter- pretation of' a statute granting others whioh are not inconsistent. This is doubly true when it appears, as here. that the very right which the statute purports to grant is one Which already exists. For instance, an act granting a defendant the right of trial by jury. in a case where such right already exists, could not. by resort to the maxim. be interpreted as a repeal of cther statutes granting such right in other cases. If this oonclusicn is correct we are not at liberty to write into the Aot of 1879, by way of interpretation. the word "cnly." and without it that pcrtion of the statute in question oonfers upon plaintiff nothing it had not theretcfore. and takes from it nothing it theretofore had. He aocordingly find that the complaint states a cause of action. (11) It remains only to oonsider whether the deImlrrer for Viant of parties was good. This depends upon the availability of the remedy sought. If lIllUldamus Was the proper remedy. other water users on the strelUll need not be made parties. The rights cf all have been established by deorees entered in general adjudication proceedings. The remedy here sought is simply the enforoe- ment of such judgments by cfficials charged therewith. That the remedy is the ocrrect one and the parties sufficient is, we think, amply established by the following. People ex rel. v. Jefferson Dist. Court, 46 Colo. 386, 104 Pac. 484; Smith v. SOhool Dist.. 88 Colo. 309, 295 Pac. 794; Terrace Dist. v. Braiden. 92 Colo. 292. 299, 19 P. (2d) 756. .-4-