WSP01337

• File Number: 8051
• Description: Area of Origin
• Basin: Statewide
• Date: 10/1/1985
• Title: Addressing the Area of Origin Problem - A Research Report Prepared for the Colorado Water Resource Research Institute
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

DRAFT

Colorado River leaving nothing for their own later development.

The permanent division of water incorporated into the compact

arrangement was intended to protect development interests in
these upstream states.32
Since the 1907 case of Kansas v. Color~d033 the U.S. supreme

,
Court has taken original jurisdiction in litigation between

states regarding interstate waters.

In g~neral, the Court has

applied the law of pr ior appropr ia t ion in c'ases invol vi ng sta tes
I

recognizing this doctrine.34

Not surprisingly, emphasis is

generally on protection of existing uses and provision for

apparent new uses.

,
Area of origin protection has not played a

,
significant role in court decisions under tqis doctrine.

Formal reservations of water provide more certainty of some
I

share of protection to areas of origin.

,
A~ demonstra ted in the

interstate context by the Colorado Riv,er, such guaranteed

protection can assure the future availability of water for

slower-developing areas of origin.

At the same time such an

approach creates inflexibility.

It is difficult to project the

amount of water that may be needed in such areas of origin. Res-

ervations or apportionments that are fixed 'become difficult to

32Indeed the lower basin states have long since diverted
their full en.titlement of 7.5 million acre-feet per year while
the upper basin states have yet to apply their full share to
beneficial use.

33206 U.s. 46 (1907).

.34See the excellent discussion by Tarlock, "The Law of
Equitable Apportionment Revisited, Updated and Restated," 56
U. of Colo. L. Rev. (1985).

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