In re United States for Writ of Prohibition Directed to Bourquin

This is a petition by the United States of America for a writ of prohibition directed to the Honorable George M. Bourquin, *358 Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Montana, and the United States District Court for the District of Montana.

After our decision in the case of Moody v. Johnston, 66 F.(2d) 999 , Tom Dwyer and fifteen other plaintiffs in suits pending in the United States District Court for said district, filed in said court amended bills of complaint adding as parties in said suits the United States of America and Harold L. Ickes, Secretary of the Interior of the United States. The complaints as amended attempt to state a cause of action against the United States under the Act of Mav 17, 1898 ( 30 Stat. 416 , 28 USCA § 41 (25) and § 766), entitled “An Act to confer jurisdiction upon the circuit [now district] courts in certain cases.” That act is as follows:

Plaintiff Dwyer claims to be the owner in fee of certain lands located within the Flathead Indian Reservation and of eighty inches of the waters of Finley creek, for the irriga^ tion of said lands. The cbmplaint alleges that in the years 1927 and 1928 the defendant C. J. Moody, claiming…