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Show 740 INTERSTATE ADXUDICATIONS be appurtenant to the land irrigated, and beneficial use shall be the basis, the measure, and the limit of the right." We have then a direction by Congress to the Secretary of the Inte- rior to proceed in conformity with state laws in appropriating water for irrigation purposes. We have a compliance with that direction. Pursuant to that procedure individual landowners have become the appropriators of the water right, the United States being the storer and the carrier.11 We intimate no opinion whether a different pro- cedure might have been followed so as to appropriate and reserve to the United States all of these water rights. No such attempt was made. Though we assume arguendo that the United States did own all of the unappropriated water, the appropriations tinder state law were made to the individual landowners pursuant to the procedure which Congress provided in the Reclamation Act. The rights so acquired are as definite and complete as if they were obtained by direct cession from the federal government. Thus even if we assume that the United States owned the unappropriated rights, they were acquired by the landowners in the precise manner contemplated by Congress. It is argued that if the right of the United States to these water rights is not recognized, its management of the federal projects will be jeopardized. It is pointed out, for example, that Wyoming and Nebraska have laws which regulate the charges which the owners of canals or reservoirs may make for the use of water. But our decision does not involve those matters. We do not suggest that where Con- gress has provided a system of regulation for federal projects it must give way before an inconsistent state system. We are dealing here only with an allocation, through the States, of water rights among appropriators. The rights of the United States in respect to the stor- age of water are recognized. So are the water rights of the land- owners. To allocate those water rights to the United States would be to disregard the rights of the landowners. To allocate them to the States, who represent their citizens parens patriae in this proceeding,12 in no wise interferes with the ownership and operation by the United States of its storage and power plants, works, and facilities. Thus the question of the ownership by the United States of unappropriated water is largely academic so far as the narrow issues of this case are concerned. V There is some suggestion that if we undertake an apportionment of the waters of this interstate river, we embark upon an enterprise involving administrative functions beyond our province. We noted in Colorado v. Kansas, supra, p. 392, that these controversies between States over the waters of interstate streams "involve the interests of quasi-sovereigns, present complicated and delicate questions, and, due to the possibility of future changes of conditions, necessitate expert administration rather than judicial imposition of a hard and fast rule. Such controversies may appropriately be composed by negotiation and agreement, pursuant to the compact clause of the federal Constitution. 11 The right of the United States as storer and carrier Is not necessarily exhausted when It delivers the water to grantees under its irrigation projects. Thus in Icle v. United States, 263 U.S. 497 the right of the United States was held to extend to water which resulted from seepage from the irrigated lands under its project and which was not sus- ceptible of private appropriation under local law. M Kansas v. Colorado, 206 U.S. 46; Missouri v. Illinois, 180 U.S. 208. |