Indian reserved water rights : the Winters doctrine in its social and legal context, 1880s-1930s

Shurts, John 1956- (Author).

Summary: "In its 1908 decision for Winters v United States, the Supreme Court affirmed a lower-court ruling that the United States and the Gros Ventre and Assiniboine Indians had reserved rights to water in the Milk River through an 1888 treaty which created the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation in Montana. Since 1908 the Winters decision, or Indian reserved water rights doctrine, has played an important and controversial role in the West." "Indian Reserved Water Rights is the first book-length historical study of the Winters case and the early use of the reserved water doctrine. In the book, John Shurts explains how the litigation and its outcome fit well within the existing legal context and into ongoing efforts at water development in the Milk River Valley. He also examines the life of the Winters doctrine during its earliest years, primarily through a study of water-rights litigation on the Uintah Reservation, in Utah."--Jacket.

Record details

ISBN: 0806132108
ISBN: 9780806132105
Physical Description: print
xv, 333 pages : maps ; 24 cm.
Publisher: Norman : University of Oklahoma Press, ©2000.

Content descriptions

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 311-324) and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

pt. I. Winters v. United States: Litigation, Decisions, and Context. Ch. 1. Prelude to the Winters Litigation: Land Cession and Reservation Agreements, Non-Indian Settlement, and Irrigation. Ch. 2. Legal Context of the Litigation: The Prior Appropriation System and Possibilities in the Law of Water in Montana in 1905. Ch. 3. Commencement of the Winters Case: A Federal Court Decision for Fort Belknap and Its Place in the Water Issues of the Milk River Valley. Ch. 4. Winters in the Federal Court of Appeals: Reclamation Anxiety, Kansas v. Colorado, and Affirmation by the Court of Appeals. Ch. 5. Back in the Milk River Valley, 1905-1907: Reclamation, Reservation Busting, and Sugar Beet Production. Ch. 6. Winters and Allotment: The Blackfeet Reservation Allotment Legislation and Water Rights. Ch. 7. The Supreme Court's Decision in Winters: Anticlimax in the Milk River Valley, 1907-1908. Ch. 8. The People of Winters and the Natural Law of the West.