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Show STATE WATER POLICIES Table 1. Admission to Statehood in the West (States arranged by date of admission) Texas Admitted December 29, 1845 9 Stat. 108 Seceded March 2, 1861 3 Tex. Const. Ann .597 Readmitted March 30, 1870 16 Stat. 80 California Admitted September 9, 1850 9 Stat. 452 Oregon Admitted February 14, 1859 11 Stat. 383 Kansas Admitted January 29,1861 12 Stat. 126 Nevada Admitted October 31,1864 13 Stat. 749 Nebraska Admitted March 1, 1867 14 Stat. 820 Colorado Admitted August 1,1876 19 Stat. 665 North Dakota Admitted November 2, 1889 26 Stat. 1548 South Dakota Admitted November 2,1889 26 Stat. 1549 Montana Admitted November 8, 1889 26 Stat. 1551 Washington Admitted November 11,1889 26 Stat. 1552 Idaho Admitted July 3,1890 26 Stat. 215 Wyoming Admitted July 10, 1890 26 Stat. 222 Utah Admitted January 4,1896 29 Stat. 876 Oklahoma Admitted November 16,1907 35 Stat. 2160 New Mexico Admitted January 6,1912 37 Stat. 1723 Arizona Admitted February 14,1912 37 Stat. 1728 Alaska Admitted January 3,1959 73 Stat. cl6 Hawaii Admitted August 21,1959 73 Stat. c74 below, these States fall into three broad groups: (1) the easternmost six States extending from North Dakota to Texas, (2) the three States bordering the Pacific Ocean, and (3) the eight intermediate States traversed by the Continental Divide and containing most of the Great Basin and the Southwest Desert. It is to these 17 States in this compact group that the instant subtopic relates. In the overall view, both the eastern and western tiers of States include both humid and semiarid areas and hence, on the whole, are "generally less arid," and the eight intermediate States are "generally more arid." Again in general, the more humid parts of the eastern tier lie east of the 100th meridian, where their climatic characteristics grade into those of the adjoining Mississippi Valley States; whereas in the Far West it is the extreme westernmost areas between the mountain ranges and the ocean that receive the greater rainfall. Thus, the drier or semiarid parts of the nine "generally less arid" States adjoin and climatically blend into those of the eight interior "generally more arid" States. This broad separation into "generally more arid" and "generally less arid" regions-which is made for purposes of comparison-corresponds in some measure to the classification of basic water rights principles that prevails in the component States. That is, the eight interior States with the lesser rainfall ad- here to what is termed the arid region doctrine of prior appropriation of water, generally to the exclusion of the humid region riparian doctrine; whereas in the other nine States, both of these conflicting principles are recognized concurrently in legal theory, although the measure of practical importance of |