U.S. high court denies Tombstone water relief

Sierra Vista Herald/Review ^ | Howard Fischer | Capitol Media Services

[Tammy8]

Yes, and the most dangerous situation to be in back in those days was to be a homesteader or small farmer or rancher and have a good spring or other good supply of water on your land- many were murdered in cold blood so their water could be taken by large ranchers.

States really need to exert their rights and get the feds out of their business. It is silly for the feds to deny Tombstone the right to repair a water source they have used all these years.

There is supposed to be an underground river that flooded the mines around Tombstone, I guess that water is contaminated from mining but couldn’t they tap into that for fire fighting and non-drinking purposes?

[squarebarb]

Cold you cite an example of people being murdered for their water/springs by large ranchers?

[editor-surveyor]

Property rights ping!

[E.G.C.]

BTTT

[HiJinx]

Thank You, Sir!
This one is getting noticed, I hope.
John Stossel ‘liked’ it on Facebook.

[Tammy8]

It is somewhat ironic that the Silver mines around Tombstone had to be closed because they flooded with water...now Tombstone needs more water.

[Madame Dufarge]

Roberts probably doesn’t want involvement due the upcoming announcement of the rejection of Obamacare, and the potential of being accused of political favoritism.

That's the first thought that popped into my mind, too.

[editor-surveyor]

The property rights/environmental ping list is likely out of date.

Any freeper that would like to be added or subtracted please send a Freep mail.
.

[editor-surveyor]

>> “It’s federal land.” <<

.
Constitutionally, “federal land” doesn’t exist beyond the District of Columbia, and the specified military reservations.

There is no constitutional provision for the Fed Gov to hold title to any other lands.

[HiJinx]

Barb, you can read about the Pleasant Valley War, aka the Tonto Range War, between the Grahams and Tewksburys here in Arizona in the years between 1880 and 1889.

Please don't let the 'legendsofamerica' web site address fool you. This feud was probably the bloodiest in Arizona history and is well documented. You can still go to Pleasant Valley, north of Roosevelt Lake, and see the historical markers that tell the story.

From the link:

"Though the feud would last for almost a decade, it was most heated between 1886 and 1887. The conflict between the two factions began over property lines and water and grazing rights. Adding fuel to the fire was the long-standing cowboy disdain for sheep-herders. Even without legitimate conflicts, there would, no doubt, have been a personal dislike of the Tewksburys on the part of the Grahams. The Grahams also contended that the sheep grazed the open range clean, leaving nothing left for the cattle."

[NonValueAdded]

There is no constitutional provision for the Fed Gov to hold title to any other lands.

Well, in the interests of being accurate to a fault, Article I Section 8, the next to last clause, allows Congress to purchase lands (with the consent of the State in which they be) "for the erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings." That surely sounds military in original intent and not authorizing a National Park System.

But I think we're on the same page here, it is time for States to aggressively push back on the bloated central gubermint and assert their rights under the 10th Amendment.

[Uncle Chip]

Tombstone should learn a lesson from Los Angeles:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Water_Wars

[dennisw]

Your insane, nasty, vindictive, leftist dominated Federale Gov’t hard at work.

[Eva]

There is another case before the Supreme Court regarding water rights and whether or not the Indians have the right to ALL the water that is not specifically deeded to cities or individuals.

It started in WA state and lost in state court on appeal and is now at the Supreme Court. I’ve heard that the tribes in AZ are making the same claim. Sooo, maybe this case has to wait until the other cases are settled.

The goal is to give the tribes control of all the water in the west, including the storm water and they will then dole it out as they see fit and charge everyone for the water, including private well users.

[SandRat]

The mines flooded after the quake in 1897 that caused the San Pedro River to be an intermittent river. Then in the 1970s and since the EPA and enviro Nazis along with the GooberMent have been in the way of doing anything wise.

[marsh2]

The court has has already held that water rights for the Klamath Tribes “carry a priority date of time immemorial. “ Adair, 723 F.2d at 1414. http://users.sisqtel.net/armstrng/AdairIII.htm

(The Klamath Trible is an Oregon tribe that ceded lands to the US by ratified treaty. There are no CA tribes whose treaties were ratified by Congress. Non-pueblo reservations were created by Executive order only. The Court has long ago ruled that their aboriginal rights were extinguished under Mexico.)

[HiJinx]

Don’t want to hijack the Florida Voting Thread, so I thought I’d ping you to this one.

The Tombstone Shovel Brigade is organizing a work session at the springs in Miller Canyon next weekend. They’re also taking donations at their web site - see post 16.

[Tammy8]

I grew up on the old Hashknife ranch mentioned in an earlier post. All the natural sources of water on the place had the remains of an old homestead when I was a kid. There was a story about what happened to each family- most were harassed and sold out, some were accused of rustling cattle and hung or shot. One was decapitated with barb wire. These were stories told to me 50 years ago by elders that knew the history.

I am a great supporter of ranchers, lived on ranches all my life- but the huge ranchers back in the day used their money and might to get rid of the little guys. That is how they acquired enough range and water to run thousands of cattle. It is a well known part of history if you spend time on some of these large ranches.

My father-in-law’s grandfather was murdered for a spring on his property. Those that took part in that were big ranchers in the area; they accused him of trading fresh horses to outlaws as the reason for killing him, but they acquired his water when his widow moved with the children. Pretty convenient.

The government is also to blame, they encouraged homesteading in many places where it was not possible to support a family on a homestead size property. People homesteaded on available water of course- picked the best land, then were usually starving along for a while and someone would bring in a huge herd of cattle. The new rancher had to have the water to make his plan work and the only thing in the way was the homesteaders. It was a more practical use of the land to run cattle over large areas than to homestead which justified the “by any means” thinking of the big guys. This played out all over the West.

When you read the history of range wars the claim is the little guys were always rustlers or in some way outlaws. That is the justification history gives for the murders. If you get down to individual stories it seems odd that the little guy always had a prime piece of property with water that the big guys needed.

[Tammy8]

That is interesting, I didn’t know about the quake or that it changed the river. I lived on a ranch near the river at one time and in that brush by the river there are huge cracks in the ground that could easily swallow a horse and rider or more. Scary place to ride and gather cattle I can tell you. That is why there were so many wild cattle on that river for years. We assumed they were earthquake cracks but thought the quakes happened long long ago, never knew there was a more recent one.

[Caipirabob]

Sounds like the state needs to call in the militia and take over the area.

If holder sends any of his boys to Tombstone, they can become "part of the tour".