ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief summary of the various water laws in the United States. Law governing the right to use water vary from one state to another. Laws governing pollution of water are much more unified because there is unifying federal law regulating water pollution. There are two primary systems governing the right to use water: the system of riparian rights and the system of prior appropriation. States use a variety of systems for allocating percolating groundwater. These alternatives include the absolute dominion or ownership rule; the reasonable use rule or the "American rule". Artificial lakes are generally governed under the law that was used to create them. This may be federal law if the lake was created by the Corps, or it may be state law if the lake was created by an entity governed by state law. The federal Clean Water Act (CWA) and other federal law define the federal effort to regulate water pollution.
