United States v. Ahtanum Irrigation District

POPE, Circuit Judge.

This is a suit brought by the United States as trustee for the Yakima tribe of Indians to establish and quiet title to the Indians’ right to the use of the waters of Ahtanum Creek in the State of Washington, which right is alleged to have been reserved by the treaty of June 9, 1855 between the United States and the Confederated Tribes of Yakima Indians.1 This was the treaty by which the Yakima Indian reservation was set aside for the Indians. The defendants in the main are the non-Indian owners of lands outside the reservation who had appropriated or claimed rights to the…