Why is EnumMap not a SortedMap in Java?

This won't make an answer to your primary question (because only the original designers have the answer), but one approach I was considering was for you to implement it yourself. While trying to make a SortedMap implementation based on EnumMap, I came up with the following class.

This is surely a quick and dirty implementation (and note that it is not fully compliant with SortedMap - because the view requirements is not met), but if you need one, you can improve it:

class SortedEnumMap<K extends Enum<K>, V> 
    extends EnumMap<K, V> 
    implements SortedMap<K, V> {

    private Class<K> enumClass;
    private K[] values;

    public SortedEnumMap(Class<K> keyType) {
        super(keyType);
        this.values = keyType.getEnumConstants();
        this.enumClass = keyType;

        if (this.values.length == 0) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Empty values");
        }
    }

    @Override
    public Comparator<? super K> comparator() {
        return Comparator.comparingInt(K::ordinal);
    }

    @Override
    public SortedMap<K, V> subMap(K fromKey, K toKey) {
        List<K> keys = Arrays.stream(this.values)
                .dropWhile(k -> k.ordinal() < fromKey.ordinal())
                .takeWhile(k -> k.ordinal() < toKey.ordinal())
                .collect(Collectors.toList());

        return this.forKeys(keys);
    }

    @Override
    public SortedMap<K, V> headMap(K toKey) {
        List<K> keys = new ArrayList<>();

        for (K k : this.values) {
            if (k.ordinal() < toKey.ordinal()) {
                keys.add(k);
            } else {
                break;
            }
        }

        return this.forKeys(keys);
    }

    @Override
    public SortedMap<K, V> tailMap(K fromKey) {
        List<K> keys = new ArrayList<>();

        for (K k : this.values) {
            if (k.ordinal() >= fromKey.ordinal()) {
                keys.add(k);
            }
        }

        return this.forKeys(keys);
    }

    //Returned map is NOT a "view" or the current one
    private SortedEnumMap<K, V> forKeys(List<K> keys) {
        SortedEnumMap<K, V> n = new SortedEnumMap<>(this.enumClass);
        keys.forEach(key -> n.put(key, super.get(key)));

        return n;
    }

    @Override
    public K firstKey() {
        return this.values[0];
    }

    @Override
    public K lastKey() {
        return this.values[this.values.length - 1];
    }
}

And for a quick test (bugs yet to be found):

SortedMap<Month, Integer> m = new SortedEnumMap(Month.class);

for (Month v : Month.values()) {
    m.put(v, v.getValue());
}

System.out.println("firstKey():       " + m.firstKey());
System.out.println("lastKey():        " + m.lastKey());
System.out.println("headMap/June:     " + m.headMap(Month.JUNE));
System.out.println("tailMap/June:     " + m.tailMap(Month.JUNE));
System.out.println("subMap/April-July " + m.subMap(Month.APRIL, Month.JULY));

I get:

firstKey():       JANUARY
lastKey():        DECEMBER
headMap/June:     {JANUARY=1, FEBRUARY=2, MARCH=3, APRIL=4, MAY=5}
tailMap/June:     {JUNE=6, JULY=7, AUGUST=8, SEPTEMBER=9, OCTOBER=10, NOVEMBER=11, DECEMBER=12}
subMap/April-July {APRIL=4, MAY=5, JUNE=6}

Open feature request

I was able to find this issue for OpenJDK. It is from 2005 yet still open/unresolved.

I'd assume there isn't any "good reason" for this being not implemented.