Sutter-Butte Canal Co. v. Great Western Power Co.

This appeal is from an order denying defendants’ motion for a change of venue.

The complaint alleges that the plaintiff is a public utility engaged in the sale and distribution of water to the inhabitants of Butte and Sutter Counties for irrigation and domestic uses; that it is the owner of a canal heading at a point on Feather River in Butte County and running thence through that county and Sutter County; that it is the owner of the right to appropriate, divert throug’h said canal, and use 2,500 second-feet of the water naturally flowing in Feather River; that an appropriation of 2,000 second-feet of said water was made at the head of said canal in the year 1902 and that an additional appropriation of 500 second-feet thereof was made in 1918 at a point in Sutter County where plaintiff pumps water from the river into its aforesaid canal; and that the defendants claim said water adversely to plaintiff and “threaten to impound and store and take and divert large quantities of the waters of said Feather River above the said diverting works of plaintiff at times when there will remain less water flowing in the said river than the said quantity so appropriated and used by plaintiff,…