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SYMPOSIUM PROCEEDINGS SEPTEMBER 1999 MODERATOR: DALLIN JENSEN, ATTORNEY AND FORMER UTAH SOLICITOR GENERAL The body of law that we call the Law of the River means different things to different people, but there is a core group of documents that we all know. It starts with the Colorado River Compact, then the Boulder Canyon Project Act, which authorized construction of Hoover Dam and ratified the Colorado River Compact. It is this act that really apportioned the Lower Basin's allocation of water, although those states didn't fully realize that until the Supreme Court's decision in Arizona v. California. The Mexican Water Treaty of 1944 allocated Mexico 1.5 million acre-feet. The Upper Basin states were able to achieve a more harmonious result among themselves and agreed upon percentage apportion- ment of their water in1948. These are the documents apportioning the river. We have additional documents that impact the river: the Colorado River Storage Project Act of 1956 authorized the construction of Glen Canyon Dam and projects in the Upper Basin, such as the Central Utah Project, which assisted Upper Basin states in ~ Panelists (left to right): John Leshy, us. Department of the Interior; Jerome C Muys, Attorney; Moderator Dallin Jensen, Attorney; Michael Pearce, Arizona Department of Water Resources; David Getches, University of Colorado; and Gary Weatheiford, Weatheiford and Taaffe. using their allocations; the Colorado River Basin Project Act of 1968 that authorized the Central Arizona Project, modified priorities between Arizona and California and set forth the operating criteria for the GLen Canyon and Hoover dams. And then you have the more detailed operating criteria adopted by the Secretary. Other important documents include the Minute to the Mexican Treaty, which addressed the salinity problem in the Lower River, the Colorado River Salinity Control Act of 1964, and, of course, a series of environmental laws such as the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act. The water buffaloes on the river tend to not want to refer to the environ- mental laws as part of the Law of the River, but these laws are very important in how the river is adminis- tered. Some people even believe that those laws could effectively reapportion the river in that Upper Basin states may not be able to utilize their full allocations as they had expected.