Columnist Hal Rothman: On how Bob Lewis is trying to turn back the clock by making a revolutionary power play for a Lincoln County stream

Hal Rothman

Sunday, Dec. 11, 2005 | 9:07 a.m.

Hal Rothman is a professor of History at UNLV. His column appears Sunday.

It is not often in Southern Nevada that we get to witness an attempt at a genuinely revolutionary act, but this past week, we saw one: Moapa Valley rancher Bob Lewis brought earth-moving equipment onto public land and illegally diverted a Lincoln County stream.

Lewis' actions were reminiscent of those of the fictional Joe Mondragon, the main character in John Nichols' "The Milagro Beanfield War," a novel that turns on precisely the theme that Lewis seeks to exploit. In the book and the subsequent Robert Redford movie, Mondragon kicks over a sluice gate and illegally waters his beanfield.

This small action, one simple kick, overturns the existing structure, and sets off commotion that leads from the development community all the way to the governor's office. It is a riotous thumb in the eye of authority.

Of course, Lewis is hardly Joe Mondragon, and despite the tumult, he is unlikely to have his way. Instead of being revolutionary, Lewis is reactionary, seeking to turn the clock back to a time when ranchers with their federal subsidies ruled Nevada, when the first person who got his hands on any water got to keep it, no matter whether he did something productive with it or simply spilled it in the desert.

In that world, Nevada's power was in the rural counties. Nevada cities were small and weak, centers to which rural people came to trade, but largely irrelevant to the economy and the politics of the state. Boy, have things changed!

Lewis is making a "culture-and-custom" argument. He is saying by his actions that because he claims he once used that water, he is entitled to it forever. First in time, first in right, and damn the consequences to everybody else. That's the Western way.

We're so far past that stage now that such an action is simply retrograde and backward-looking, a kind of self-indulgence we more typically associate with Southern California. In the past 15 years the world of water has changed dramatically.

For the most part, the battles about water have ended. In Southern Nevada, we no longer fight about water. We negotiate. The premium is on cooperation, on bringing stakeholders to the table and letting them sort out the distribution of this precious resource.

Conservation is on the rise in urban areas -- albeit with occasional setbacks -- and the economic value of water used in urban areas so far exceeds that of rural use that it's hard to find any other explanation than culture and custom for the water that agriculture and ranching uses in Nevada.

And don't make arguments to me about the importance of agriculture and ranching to the food supply. Everything Nevada grows is surplus, pure and simple.

America will not starve without Nevada's alfalfa, a crop that consumes incredible amounts of water even by agricultural standards. And if you ate a hamburger three times a day, 365 days a year, the chances of taking a bite out of a cow that grazed in Nevada remain infinitesimally small.

The idea that rural and urban interests can sit down and negotiate water has been thoroughly underplayed. For those who write about water, it's been too easy to focus on conflict. It's a better story.

As much as I admire people who take a stand, no matter how cock-eyed, this is a world of grown-ups now. Negotiation and compromise are the watchwords. Boring? Sure. In all of our best interests? Absolutely.

Nobody should be forced to give up their water. Nor should anybody be able to stymie economic progress for their own purposes. There is a happy medium and we can achieve it. We must sit at the table and negotiate with a clear understanding of every stakeholder's needs and wants. As the region grows, this question will become more acute.

Bob Lewis and his ilk make good press, but they don't get us any closer to solutions. In America, when you pull out the figurative hand grenades, you're showing that you do not have power. This is a sophomoric approach, little different from the late Edward Abbey, pulling up road stakes in his precious wilderness.

Showmanship is grand, but if you're not at the table, you can't hold your own.