OCR Text |
Show practical benefit in demonstrating 205 navigability . " In this ( re- re ) port the opinion was expressed that the river could be made navigable by dams , dikes and confined channels , ranging from 200 to 500 feet in different sections . In March , 1888 , a permanent Board of Engineers on improvement of the river from Wichita to the mouth of the Canadian River reported that the commerce over that section is and always has been practically nothing , estimated the cost by ( con- con ) traction works of a navigable depth of two feet at low water as exceeding their value , expressed grave doubts as to maintaining it , and designated movable dams or a canal as a proper means of ( obtaining obt-ainhig obtainhig ) steady navigation , . if ( justify justify- justify ) ing the expense . In 1891 another report was made , stating that a dependable two foot channel could not be obtained ( ex- ex ) cept in April or probably May or June . In its opinion the trial court says at page 623 : ( "The The ) use of that portion of the river for transportation boats has been exceptional and necessarily on ( high Ibigh ) water , was found impracticable , and was abandoned . The rafting of logs or freight has been attended with difficulties precluding utility . There was no practical susceptibility to use as a . highway of trade or travel . " In ( Brewer-Elliott BrewerElliott ) Oil & ( Gas Ga-s Gas ) Co . et ( al at ) . V . United States et al , 270 Fed . 100 , the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals * makes only a meager statement of facts but refers to the opinion of the trial court ( reviewed in the next preceding paragraphs of this brief ) for such statement . In United States V . Rio Grande Dam and Irrigation Co . , 174 U . S . 690 , the government sought to restrain defendant from constructing a dam across the Rio Grande River . The U . S . Supreme Court decision does not contain a very full statement of the facts with reference to navigability but those facts are quite fully recited at pages 675-676 of the opinion of the Supreme Court of New Mexico found in 51 Pac . 674 . From the opinion of that Court it appears that as the Rio Grande traverses New Mexico , it spreads out over a wide area , over fine , light , sandy soil of great depth ; that it is shallow ; that bars continually form , pass away and reform , and that the quicksands in the bed of the stream and along its margin are perilous to life ; that through that territory the fall of the river is from 4 to 52 feet to the mile , and that the changes in its course are rapid , continual and often radical ; that ( "in in ) all the period of ( time tigne ) ( only o2zly ) ( tivo two ) ( in- in ) |