When they came into the possession of the United States they did so with very little in the way of pre-existing claims ~ a few hundred unpopulated Spanish or Mexican land grants of course ~ i can talk all day about how unfair the law has been to some of us when it comes to fully recovering property ~ but they also came in with Spanish origin water rights law in place.
These laws were developed over thousands of years in other semi-arid regions. To a degree they are very simple ~ if you find a spot where you can divert water to your use, and nobody else has done that before ~ upstream or downstream ~ then you can use that water and the guy upstream can't divert it to his use and deprive you of water!n The guy downstream can't use it either!
It doesn't matter who owns the land upstream or downstream ~ the rights to the water are dealt with separately under their own set of laws ~ and land is dealt with under its set of laws. Prior-appropriation is one of the terms you'll find has great meaning in dealing with riparian rights.
There are thousands of lawyers in America who make a good living helping settle disputes regarding water rights.
Inasmuch as government can sell and issue title to land ~ government can also sell, loan, regulate and issue title to water ~ even the drops that fall from the sky.
For the most part our Eastern states have enough water on hand that all comers can divert water for their use ~ after all, they'll have to put it somewhere won't they. The water rights laws are entirely different there, but like the Western states government sold land, with or without water and mineral rights, and your title to the land may or may not include water and/or mineral rights ~ but it's simply invisible to you because of the amount of rainfall you get.
In this case someone secured some water under the laws appropriate to that area and then started giving it away to others. If the law gave him the right to drink it himself that's one thing, but if the law didn't give him the right to give it away that's another.
Bottled water that you buy?
By the same token, a person would have to have “mineral rights” in order to be able to take food they’ve grown on their own land to a potluck. Or actually, they’d have to have mineral rights to take ANY food to a potluck. Or to serve food to any guests at their home.
I hear what you’re saying about the scarcity of water; that’s becoming quite an issue even here in Nebraska with rivers and creeks drying up this year. But if this includes commodities you buy from an outside region and it’s taken to its logical conclusion, the only people who can even eat or drink in those states are people who own land and have land and water rights. How can renters have any right to eat or drink? How can anybody who visits those states but doesn’t live there?