The Supreme Court's decision reverses that ruling from the appeals court. It is important, he said, for courts to leave “to Congress and the President the responsibility to enact appropriations laws and to otherwise update federal law as they see fit in light of the competing contemporary needs for water.”Ī federal trial court initially dismissed the lawsuit, but an appeals court allowed it to go forward. “Allocating water in the arid regions of the American West is often a zero-sum situation,” he wrote.
Kavanaugh acknowledged that water issues are difficult ones. Writing for a majority made up of conservative justices, Justice Brett Kavanaugh explained that “the Navajos contend that the treaty requires the United States to take affirmative steps to secure water for the Navajos - for example, by assessing the Tribe's water needs, developing a plan to secure the needed water, and potentially building pipelines, pumps, wells, or other water infrastructure.”īut, Kavanaugh said, "In light of the treaty's text and history, we conclude that the treaty does not require the United States to take those affirmative steps.” In 2003 the tribe sued the federal government, arguing it had failed to consider or protect the Navajo Nation’s water rights to the lower portion of the Colorado River. The second treaty established the reservation as the tribe’s “permanent home” - a promise the Navajo Nation says includes a sufficient supply of water. The facts of the case go back to treaties that the tribe and the federal government signed in 18.
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