Owen J. Roberts

“ In conclusion, Puerto Rico has not treated respondent the same as landowners who have no water rights. The latter have to pay for the construction of the irrigation system as well as for its maintenance and operation. Respondent on the other hand is merely required to contribute towards the cost of maintenance and operation of the system. On these facts that favored treatment is sufficient respect for the integrity of respondent's property rights. To free it from all burden is to give it a windfall. ”

“ To enforce the present tax is not to renig on that undertaking. The fact that respondent was to bear 'all extra expenses' in case water was delivered at intakes other than the designated ones seems to me hardly more than a provision that respondent was to bear the cost in case the irrigation system had to be partially relocated to meet its requirements. In any event, it does no more than raise a doubt as to the correct interpretation of the contract-a doubt which, as subsequently pointed out should not be resolved against the power of Puerto Rico to impose this tax. ”

“ Whereas Fortuna had, prior to the erection of the dam, the right to take over 12,000 acre-feet of water per year for irrigation, a proportation of surplus waters, and certain torrential waters, the supply was uneven and uncertain due to the irregularity of rainfall. It was, therefore, an advantage to the respondent's predecessor to surrender its maximum rights in consideration of an agreement that there should be delivered to it, equally and evenly throughout the year, something less than the maximum it was entitled to take under preexisting conditions. ”