IRRIGATION DISTRICT OPERATION AXD FIXAXCE. 41 
way has been paved for eventual cooperation between districts already 
formed on some of the interstate projects of the Reclamation Service 
when the districts shall have taken over the operation of the irrigation 
svstems concerned. 
DISSOLUTION. 
The fact that every district formed is not destined to become 
operative, and that operating districts may eventually outlive their 
usefulness, has called for some means of providing for their legal dis- 
continuance. The Wright Act made no provision for dissolution, 
but subsequent legislation in California and other States has provided 
for dissolution of districts by the courts, or by the county governing 
bodies, or by the districts themselves. Xo district may escape its 
obligations through disorganization, and the decree of dissolution is 
dependent upon liquidation of indebtedness 
Of the 158 irrigation districts in the United 
58 have been formally dissolved. 
IRRIGATION DISTRICT DEVELOPMENT. 
States classed as inactive 
EARLY UTAH DISTRICTS. 
The first irrigation district legislation in the United States was 
enacted by the Territory of Utah January 20, 1S65, providing for 
irrigation districts within counties, but making no provision for bond 
issues. This law was immediately put into operation, with the result 
that a large number of such enterprises were formed during the fol- 
lowing quarter -century in various parts of the Territory. Xo attempt 
has been made to ascertain the exact extent of operations under this 
law. for the present investigation has been concerned primarily with 
the type of district first authorized by the Wright Act: but it is 
known that the number of early Utah districts was large 5 and it is also 
apparent that very little in the way of actual construction was accom- 
plished by them. 6 Such districts, then, while created on an extensive 
scale in an effort to provide a more satisfactory means of organization 
for irrigation development than had been devised up to that time, 
had small share in the irrigation achievements of the State and have 
been generally forgotten in the communities in which they were 
organized. The few that still exist are thought of rather as companies 
and bear little analogy to the present-day irrigation districts. 
THE WRIGHT ACT. 
Following a number of unsuccessful legislative attempts to provide 
for public irrigation enterprises, and in response to a demand from 
farmers of San Joaquin Valley, Calif., for a means of organization by 
which an obstructing minority could be compelled to contribute to 
the cost of building an irrigation system, California in 1S87 passed 
the Wright Act. 7 This law provided, briefly, that 50 or a majority 
of freeholders owning lands susceptible of one mode of irrigation 
from a common source and by the same system of works might pro- 
pose the organization of an irrigation district by petition to the 
5 George Thomas, in the Development of Institutions under irrigation, states that a conservative esti- 
mate would place the na b organizations at about 100. 
5 l*. S. Department of Agriculture, Office of Experiment Stations Bui. 124, recounts numerous unsuc- 
cessful attempts to build irrigation works under this law. 
7 The history of irrigation districts in California from 1SS7 to 1915 is given in Bulletin 2, California 
State Department of Engineering, by Frank Adams. 
