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Show 552 INTERSTATE ADJ UDICATIONS appropriation, but not beyond that reasonably required and actually used. The appropriator first in time is prior in right over others upon the same stream, and the right, when perfected by use, is deemed effective from the time the purpose to make the appropriation is definitely formed and actual work upon the project is begun, or from the time statutory requirements of notice of the proposed appropri- ation are complied with, provided the work is carried to completion and the -water is applied to a beneficial use with reasonable diligence. See Arizona v. California, supra; Kansas v. Colorado, 206 U.S. 46; Wyoming v. Colorado, 259 U.S. 419. Arizona, by her proposed bill of complaint, asserts no right arising from her own appropriation of the waters of the Colorado River. No infringement of her rights acquired toy appropriation is alleged, and no relief for their protection is prayed. While it is alleged that definite plans have been made for the irrigation of 1,000,000 acres of unirrigated land in Arizona, and a right to share in the water for that purpose is asserted, it does not appear that any initial step toward appropriation of water for such a project has been taken. The right of the California corporations to withdraw from the river a total of 5,362,000 acre feet annually under the contracts with the Secretary of the Interior, is challenged only insofar as the prayer for relief asks that the unappropriated water of the river be equitably apportioned among Arizona and the defendant states, and that any increased amount to which the Republic of Mexico may be entitled be directed to be supplied from the amount to which California may otherwise be found to be equitably entitled. Arizona does not assert any right to the benefit of the undertaking of California, in conformity to the Boulder Canyon Project Act, to restrict its own use of the water. The brief for Arizona disclaims the assertion of any rights under "the Boulder Canyon Project Act, the Colorado River Compact, or the Boulder Project itself." The allegations and prayer of the bill are of significance only if Arizona, in advance of any act of appropriation, and independently of any rights which she may have acquired under the Boulder Canyon Project Act, may demand a judicial decree exempting the available water of the river, or some of it, from appropriation by other states until the indefinite time in the future when she or her inhabitants may see fit to appropriate it. A justiciable controversy is presented only if Arizona, as a sovereign state, or her citizens, whom she repre- sents, have present rights in the unappropriated water of the river, or if the privilege to appropriate the water is capable of division and when partitioned may be judicially protected from appropriations by others pending its exercise. The defendant states deny that there is any such right or privilege upon which this Court can act judicially in advance of appropriation. While California, by statement of her attorney general in brief and argument, disclaims any purpose to take more than the water to which she is restricted by the Boulder Canyon Project Act and by her own statute, she, and the other defendant states, nevertheless maintain that the authority of this Court is limited to the application of the local law of appropriation in adjudicating their rights. They deny that Arizona and her inhabitants have or can assert any right in the water before its appropriation, and challenge the jurisdiction |
