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<br />o. (\ 1~". I <br />, U.LV':"'! <br /> <br />970 <br /> <br />ECOLOGY lA W QUARTERLY <br /> <br />[Vol. 28:903 <br /> <br />Through this formula, the U.S. committecl itself to provide <br />Mexico with water the salinity of which is roughly equivalent to <br />the water received by farmers in the Imperial Irrigation District. <br />Minute 242 was achieved after bitter dispute between the two <br />sides, and has left a legacy of hard feelings, particularly on the <br />Mexican side.403 <br />Given this context. the second MCE proposal would almost <br />certainly have been unacceptable to Mexico. because it would <br />have allowed the U.s. to shift part of its Mexico-U.S. Water <br />Treaty burden to maintain Colorado River water quality to <br />Mexico. Under the proposal, Mexico would essentially have been <br />required to accept increased deliveries of high-salinity water in <br />order to get a reduced amount of low salinity water. In this way, <br />Mexican water use would have been sacrificed in the interests of <br />salinity control and Delta restoration, with rio corresponding <br />sacrifice on the part of the U.S. As revised, the water-trading <br />alternative avoids this difficulty, but substitutes another by <br />requiring U.S. users to forgo vested rights to the use of Colorado <br />River water for the benefit of the Delta. WhUe this is undoubtedly <br />the right approach from the Mexican perspective, the second <br />MCE proposal thereby manifests all of the political disadvantages <br />of the late Pacific Institute proposal, which the entrenched <br />Colorado River interests easily managed to block in the latest <br />battles over the Interim Surplus Criteria. <br />So long as the Mexican legal system allows land and water <br />rights to be retired and the water delivered to the Delta, the first <br />MCE altemative represents a practical means of acquiring water <br />for the Delta. Any long-term solution, however, must be <br />binational in nature. The. historical context must inform any <br />solution to the Delta problem. Mexico has seen one of its largest <br />rivers, wealthiest agricultural districts, and most important <br />fisheries dried up, or salted up, by U.S. development upstream. <br />From a Mexican perspective, the Mexico-U.S. Water Treaty - <br />negotiated during a period of U.S. dominance and relative <br />Mexican weakness - was substantively unfair.404 In the <br />intervening years, the U.S. has consistently denied responsibility <br /> <br />Salinity of the Colorado River, August 30, 1973, U.S.-Mex., reprinted in 68 AM. J. <br />INT'LL.376,377(1974). <br />403. For an excellent history of the dispute, see FRADKIN. supra note 9, at 303-18. <br />404. rd. at 303-04. <br />