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Show 492 INTERSTATE ADJUDICATIONS River. Colorado and several of the corporations answered., For reasons which will be apparent from the opinion the defenses of these corpora- tions will not be considered apart from those of Colorado. On March 21, 1904, the United States, upon leave, filed its petition of intervention. The issue between these several parties having been perfected by replications, a commissioner was appointed to take evi- dence, and after that had been taken and abstracts prepared counsel for the respective parties were heard in argument, and upon the plead- ings and testimony the case was submitted. ******* Mr. Justice Brewer, after making the foregoing statement, deliv- ered the opinion of the court. While we said in overruling the demurrer that "this court, speaking broadly, has jurisdiction," we contemplated further consideration of both the fact and the extent of our jurisdiction, to be fully determined after the facts were presented. We therefore commence with this in- quiry. And first of our jurisdiction of the controversy between Kansas and Colorado. This suit involves no question of boundary or of the limits of terri- torial jurisdiction. Other and incorporeal rights are claimed by the respective litigants. Controversies between the States are becoming frequent, and in the rapidly changing conditions of life and business are likely to become still more so. Involving as they do the rights of political communities, which in many respects are sovereign and inde- pendent, they present not infrequently questions of far-reaching import and of exceeding difficulty. It is well, therefore, to consider the foundations of our jurisdiction over controversies between States. It is no longer open to question that by the Constitution a nation was brought into being, and that that instrument was not merely operative to establish a closer union or league of States. Whatever powers of government were granted to the Nation or reserved to the States (and for the description and limita- tion of those powers we must always accept the Constitution as alone and absolutely controlling), there was created a nation to be known as the United States of America, and as such then assumed its place among the nations of the world. The first resolution passed by the convention that framed the Con- stitution, sitting as a committee of the whole, was: "Resolved, That it is the opinion of this committee that a national government ought to be established, consisting of a supreme legislative, judiciary, and executive." 1 Eliot's Debates, 151. ******* In the Constitution are provisions in separate articles for the three great departments of government-legislative, executive and judicial. But there is this significant difference in the grants of powers to these departments: The first article, treating of legislative powers, does not make a general grant of legislative power. It reads: "Article I, Sec- tion 1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Con- gress," etc.; and then in Article VIII mentions and defines the legis- lative powers that are granted. By reason of the fact that there is no |
