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Show 158 THE PUEBLO WATER RIGHT Thus the soundness of the foundation on which the principle of unrestricted expansion of the pueblo right rests is not material in California law. This has been so for decades. PUEBLO WATER RIGHTS IN NEW MEXICO The Cartwright case, as it is commonly known, was decided by the New Mexico Supreme Court in 1958.60 This was preceded by two decisions of this court rendered, respectively, in 1914 and 1937-38, in which claims of pueblo rights were involved but in which the pueblo water rights doctrine was neither approved nor disapproved. The Cartwright case, on the other hand, produced a contemporaneous, definitive decision on the subject of the pueblo water rights. Doctrine Not Applicable in Earlier Cases Tularosa The New Mexico Supreme Court early held that no exclusive right on the part of the residents of the town of Tularosa to the use of water could be sustained under what was known under Spanish laws and customs as a "pueblo right."61 The court said:62 Whether the "Ran of Pictic" applied to that portion of New Mexico, of which this state was a part, is wholly immaterial, for this townsite grant was made by officers of the United States Government, under authority of an act of congress, long after New Mexico became a part of the United States, and of course would be subject to and controlled by the laws of the granting sovereign. Whatever might have been the rights of the people of this settlement, had the land been acquired from the Mexican Govern- ment by grant, or otherwise, is of no consequence. The land having been acquired from the United States, after it had passed under its jurisdiction and control, the grant would carry with it only such rights and privileges as were accorded by the laws of the United States. Santa Fe In the 1930's, a trial court ruled that "pueblo right" as defined in certain California cases obtained in New Mexico.63 This trial court "held in effect that "Cartwright v. Public Sen. Co. ofN. Mex., 66 N. Mex. 24, 343 Pac. (2d) 654 (1958). 61 State ex rel. Community Ditches v. Tularosa Community Ditch, 19 N. Mex. 352, 376, 143 Pac. 207 (1914). " 19 N. Mex. at 378. "See New Mexico Products Co. v. New Mexico Power Co., 42 N. Mex. 311, 315, 77 Pac. (2d) 634 (1937), referring particularly to San Diego v. Cuyamaca Water Co., 209 Cal. |
