there ain't nothing you can do for me, nor do i want anything from you
> foot modeling slide
States make their own laws on whether and how individuals can collect rainwater.
https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/verify/no-federal-law-people-collecting-rainwater-united-states-fact-check/536-1ed6a646-6591-466a-916a-290a5ddc621f
https://www.texasmonthly.com/the-culture/boone-pickens-wants-to-sell-you-his-water/
Texas is the only western state whose groundwater use is defined by rule of capture. The law was upheld by a 1904 Texas Supreme Court ruling that groundwater’s properties are “too secret, occult, and concealed” to establish a set of rules regulating its use. The rule actually worked for the first 150 years of statehood with a minimum of violence, murder, and corruption. A 1949 law and enough instances when the civic wells ran dry in the fifties inspired the creation of numerous groundwater districts across the state, particularly in the Panhandle and West Texas. (They included the Panhandle Groundwater Conservation District, formed in 1955 to oversee the pumping of the Ogallala.) The basic idea was to set up a public body to protect farmers against other farmers taking more than their fair share. Each district oversees a specific underground reservoir and can regulate and monitor its use. But their regulatory power has seldom been tested in the courts, and experts say it is highly unlikely that they could prevent a landowner like Pickens from pumping.
In Texas, rule of capture is considered so sacred and such a cornerstone of property rights, that the Legislature has never mustered the political courage to overturn the law. In 1997 it came as close as it could, passing Senate Bill 1, a landmark piece of water legislation that created sixteen regions in Texas and required them to come up with plans to ensure groundwater supplies for the next fifty years. It was a nice idea, but the rule of capture still trumps groundwater districts, as affirmed last year by the Texas Supreme Court. The court upheld the Ozarka Water Company’s right to capture water under its property and bottle it, throwing out a lawsuit filed by neighboring East Texas landowners who claimed their wells, creeks, and streams were running dry thanks to Ozarka. SB 1 also made possible the transfer of water from one river basin to another, which solved critical water-planning issues for San Antonio and Corpus Christi. But that also opened the door for water to be pumped and piped from anywhere in Texas. This caught the attention of people with experience in extracting a resource from the ground and making money from it.