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Show 652 INTERSTATE ADJUDICATIONS necessary to keep up navigation in the Chicago Eiver, which really is part of the Port of Chicago, but that amount is negligible as com- pared with 8,500 second feet now being diverted. Hence, beyond that negligible quantity, the validity of the Secretary's permit derives its support entirely from a situation produced by the Sanitary District in violation of the complainants' rights; and but for that support com- plainants might properly press for an immediate shutting down by injunction of the diversion, save any small part needed to maintain navigation in the river. In these circumstances we think they are entitled to a decree which will be effective in bringing that violation and the unwarranted part of the diversion to an end. But in keeping with the principles on which courts of equity condition their relief, and by way of avoiding any unnecessary hazard to the health of the people of that section, our decree should be so framed as to ac- cord to the Sanitary District a reasonably practicable time within which to provide some other means of disposing of the sew^age, reduc- ing the diversion as the artificial disposition of the sewage increases from time to time, until it is entirely disposed of thereby, when there shall be a final, permanent operative and effective injunction. It is very apparent from the report of the Master and from the state legislation that the Legislature of Illinois and the Sanitary District have for a long period been strongly insistent upon such a use of the waters of Lake Michigan as would dispose of the sewage of the Dis- trict and incidentally furnish a navigable water route from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi basin; and that not until 1903 was the attention of the public, and especially of the District authorities, drawn to the fact that a diversion like that now used would lower the Lake levels with injurious consequences to the Great Lakes navigation and to the complainant States. The Secretary of War and the Chief of Engineers in 1907 refused a permit by which there would be more than 4,167 feet a second diverted. Advised that the District authori- ties proposed to ignore that limitation, the United States brought suit against the authorities of the District to enjoin any diversion in excess of that quantity, as fixed in an earlier permit. Another appli- cation for enlargement was made to Secretary of War Stimson in 1913 and was rejected. For several years, including the inexcusable delays made possible by the failure of the Federal Court in Chicago to render a decision in the suit brought by the United States, the District authorities have been maintaining the diversion of 8,500 cubic feet per second or more on the plea of preserving the health of the District. Putting this plea forward has tended materially to hamper and obstruct the remedy to which the complainants are entitled in vindication of their rights, riparian and other. The intervening States on the same side with Illinois, in seeking a recognition of asserted rights in the navigation of the Mississippi, have answered denying the rights of the complainants to an injunc- tion. They really seek affirmatively to preserve the diversion from Lake Michigan in the interest of such navigation and interstate com- merce though they have made no express prayer therefor. In our view of the permit of March 3, 1925, and in the absence of direct authority from Congress for a waterway from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi, they show no rightful interest in the maintenance of the diversion. Their motions to dismiss the bills are overruled and so far as their answer may suggest affirmative relief, it is denied. |