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Show SPECIAL STATUTORY ADJUDICATION PROCEDURES 447 the benefit of public records and surveys in the making of investigations and reports upon which the trial court bases its adjudication. Evolvement and Implementation of the Statutory Adjudication Concept In chapter 7, under "Methods of Appropriating Water of Watercourses," there is a discussion of the inadequacies of the pre-administrative procedures for appropriating water in the West and the evolution of the threefold State administrative systems pertaining to watercourses-appropriation, adjudication, and supervised diversion and distribution of waters pursuant to decrees of the courts. Before the appropriation of water was first put under State administra- tive control in Wyoming-combined with adjudication and supervision over distribution-Colorado had provided a special statutory procedure for deter- mining controversies over water rights and an accompanying special statutory proceeding for administering these diversion rights and distributing the water pursuant to court decrees. In Colorado, adjudication and supervision over diversion have gone hand in hand since 1879 and 1881 ;9 yet, unlike most Western States, State administrative control over the appropriation of stream waters, such as through the issuance of permits, has never been provided. This is consonant with a provision in the Colorado Constitution that "The right to divert the unappropriated waters of any natural stream to beneficial uses shall never be denied."10 Elwood Mead played an important role in creating Wyoming's complete and unprecedented threefold administrative system. Mead had been Assistant State Engineer of Colorado before being appointed the first Territorial Engineer of Wyoming in 1888 and first State Engineer in 1890. He brought to this new State intimate knowledge of the workings of the Colorado system of adjudication and distribution of water, and took active leadership in having incorporated in the State constitution and statutes not only the bases for 'Colo. Laws 1879, p. 94, Laws 1881, p. 142. Earlier | legislation enacted in 1860 by the'Legislature of the Kingdom of Hawaii pro- vided a system for hearing and determining all controversies respecting rights in water by appointed commissioners, subsequently replaced by the circuit judges. See "Some Other Statutory Provisions-Hawaii," infra. See also Hutchins, W. H., "The Hawaiian System of Water Rights" 48-58 (1946). It is unlikely that this Hawaiian legislation had any effect upon the Colorado Legislatures of 1879 and 1881. There was no similarity between the Hawaiian and the subsequent Colorado system of adjudication except that they were both judicial systems. Insofar as the mainland Western States are concerned, Colorado was undoubtedly the pioneer in this field. luColo. Const, art. XVI, § 6. See, in chapter 7, "Methods of Appropriating Water of Watercourses-Current Appropriation Procedures-Not Administratively Controlled- Colorado." |