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Show PUEBLO WATER RIGHTS IN CALIFORNIA 153 Although not mentioned by the court, a California statute provides that a prescriptive right to water, among other things, may not be acquired by any person, firm or corporation against any public entity. The extant version of the statute reads in part, "no possession by any person, firm or corporation no matter how long continued of any land, water, water right, easement, or other property whatsoever dedicated to a public use by a public utility or dedicated to or owned by the state or any public entity, shall ever ripen into any [prescriptive] title, interest or right against the owner thereof."41 (Emphasis added.) In an earlier case in which the pueblo rights of the City of San Diego were first litigated and established, the California Supreme Court said42 that no claim of right based upon estoppel could come into being as against a municipal corporation, founded upon its mere acquiescence or that of its officials in the diversion by any number of upper appropriators or even of upper riparian owners of the waters of a stream to the use of the waters of which such public or municipal corporation was entitled as a portion of its public rights and properties held in perpetual trust for public use. Adjudication of Pueblo Water Rights of Los Angeles and San Diego The California Supreme Court held in 1881 that from the founding of the pueblo of Los Angeles in 1781, a century earlier, the right to all the waters of Los Angeles River had been rightfully claimed by the pueblo and by the city, which succeeded to all the rights of the former pueblo. With respect to this claim of the city, "we hold that, to the extent of the needs of its inhabitants, it has the paramount right to the use of the waters of the river, and the further right, long exercised and recognized, as appears from the findings, to manage and control the said waters for those purposes."43 As previously stated under "Early Judicial Inquiries-Early Los Angeles Cases," as the opponents and then- predecessors had recognized and acknowledged this long claim of right by the city, they could not now be allowed to assert a claim of adverse right. In subsequent cases the California Supreme Court repeatedly recognized and adjudicated the pueblo water right of Los Angeles.44 41Cal. Civ. Code § 1007 (West Supp. 1970). A2San Diego v. Cuyamaca Water Co., 209 Cal. 105, 137, 142-143, 287 Pac. 475 (1930). See also Los Angeles v. Glendale, 23 Cal. (2d) 68, 142 Pac. (2d) 289, 296 (1943). A*Feliz v. Los Angeles, 58 Cal. 73, 78-80 (1881). Related case and same decision, Elmsv. Los Angeles, 58 Cal. 80 (1881). 44 Vernon In. Co. v. Los Angeles, 106 Cal. 237, 250-251, 39 Pac. 762 (1895); Los Angeles v. Pomeroy, 124 Cal. 597, 639-640, 649-650, 57 Pac. 585 (1899); Los Angeles v. Los Angeles Farming & Mill. Co., 152 Cal. 645, 651-653, 93 Pac. 869, 1135 (1908); Los Angeles v. Hunter, 156 Cal. 603, 608-609, 105 Pac. 755 (1909); Los Angeles v. |