6 BULLETIN 913, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



Permits from State engineers to appropriate water have dif- 

 ferent effects in the various States. An approved application con- 

 stitutes a permit to take water from the source named in the ap- 

 plication if any is available. In several States the engineer has 

 authority to refuse to approve an application if there is no un- 

 appropriated water in the source of supply, or if the approval is 

 contrary to the public interests. In Idaho, on the other hand, the 

 engineer is required to approve any application that is in proper form. 

 An approved application to appropriate water in one of the first 

 group of States referred to would be some indication, although not 

 a guarantee, that in the opinion of the engineer there was unappro- 

 priated water in the source named in the application. 



However, some State engineers take the position that the ap- 

 plicant is presumed to have examined the water supply and makes 

 his investments at his own risk; that, furthermore, neither the en- 

 gineer nor the applicant can predict with any assurance how much 

 water a given stream will supply in any season, and that for these 

 reasons he is justified in approving applications to some extent in 

 excess of the apparent supply if the applicant wishes to take a 

 chance on getting water. Against this practice there is one serious 

 objection — it robs such permits of all value as evidence of the value 

 of the rights represented. Enterprises based on permits to appro- 

 priate water which, in all probability, does not exist, are launched, 

 and stock, bonds, lands, or water rights, or all four, are sold to in- 

 dividuals who assume that a permit from a State official to take a 

 certain volume of water from a certain source is a guarantee that 

 water is there to be taken. In this way the .holder of the permit 

 transfers the risk, which he fully understands, to parties who do 

 not understand it. 



The purchaser of irrigated land should understand that a permit 

 to appropriate water is not a guarantee on the part of the State 

 issuing it that the quantity of water named in the permit is available, 

 Even if water is available, a permit, in itself, does not constitute a 

 right to the use of water. Building works and taking and using water 

 are necessary to the holding of the right. The permit itself fixes the 

 time within which the works must be begun and completed and the 

 time within which the water must be put to use, and a failure to com- 

 ply with any of the conditions is fatal to the holding of the right. 



The States which require applications for permits to appropriate 

 water provide for issuing certificates that the works described in 

 permits have been built and the water put to use. These certificates 

 or licenses are in the same class as court decrees as evidence of rights. 

 Eights represented by certificates or licenses can be lost by abandon- 

 ment or nonuse just as any other right, but are not so likely to have 



