Western water wars at high court focus on Navajo Nation
The fight for water in the West heads to the Supreme Court next week where the justices will decide if the government has a duty to give a tribal nation a share of the region’s most precious resource. For over a century, the Navajo Nation has been seeking recognition of get their water rights to the Colorado River. While states like New Mexico and Utah have come to settlements with the Navajo over water rights, Arizona has been a holdout in these negotiations. Now the Navajo want the federal government to step in on its behalf. … Sometimes called the American Nile, the Colorado River serves around 36 million people, starting in the central Rocky Mountains of Colorado and flowing for around 1,300 miles through Colorado, Utah and Arizona. The river also borders the Arizona-Nevada and Arizona-California borders and passes into Mexico.