9407

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 9407
• Author: Water Education Foundation.
• Title: 75th Anniversary Colorado River Compact Symposium Proceedings.
• USFW Year: 1997.
• USFW - Doc Type: \
• Copyright Material: NO

THE
S Il VE R
FOX

Carpenter at that time had already urged President
Harding to appoint a federal representative with
international experience and national stature.
"Compact negotiations would fail," he said, "if the
man representing the United States was a bureaucrat
and not a statesman." He feared that Harding might
allow the Reclamation Service to choose one of their
own people. But the president surprised him by
selecting Herbert Hoover, secretary of Commerce,
whose international reputation was already well
established. Hoover called for a meeting in Washing-
ton early in January, and although Carpenter found
the atmosphere in Washington much freer and active
than it had been under a previous administration, he
was very disturbed by what he called "Hoover's
imperious tone." "Colorado law under which I was
appointed," he wired Hoover, "provides that the
governor of Arizona, Tom Campbell, president of the
League of the Southwest, call the first meeting of the
Interstate Commission
and commissioners of
seven states who
recently agreed upon a
tentative date for call
as of Phoenix in the
latter part of January."
But Carpenter's
petulance evaporated
when he met Hoover
in person a few days
before the first
meeting. By the time all the commissioners had
gotten together in Washington, Carpenter had
successfully advocated Hoover's election as chairman,
and Hoover had returned the favor by recognizing
Carpenter's role in founding the Commission and
persuading the president and congress to approve
authorizing legislation.
Harmony on that Commission in Washington did
not prevail for very long. In a preliminary attempt to
divide up the Colorado River on the basis of poten-
tially or practicably irrigable acreage, each commis-
sioner, including Carpenter, exaggerated the amount
of land that would be irrigated in the future. On the
basis of rhese estimates, the river would be bankrupt
in short order. Hoover failed to achieve an agreement.
Existing data proved inadequate. Mistrust and
suspicion proliferated.
While California Congressman Phil Swing
challenged the commissioners to move forward
systematically and scientifically with construction of
dams and reservoirs as if the river's development were
another Panama Canal, representatives from the
Upper Basin demanded assurance that construction
of a dam in Boulder Canyon would not jeopardize

It would be the

height of crime to the

SYMPOSIUM
PROCEEDINGS
MAY 1997

o

people who sent us

here to adjourn
permanently now.

future rights of the origin states. Carpenter extended
this demand even further in Washington. Convinced
that the four states of origin would never be able to
beneficially use even an equitable part of the waters
rising and flowing within the respective territories of
each, he asked the commissioners to consider a
compact in which the upper states had no limitations
placed on them and the lower states could claim no
preferred right of title to the use of Colorado River
water following the building of dams and reservoirs.
Voting on a subsequent motion by Commissioner
Norviel, it soon became apparent that the commis-
sioners had divided into two groups: the four Upper
Basin states vs. the three Lower Basin states. Hoover
wondered if the two groups were too far apart for
further deliberations. He was inclined to suspend the
meeting then and there. Others echoed his fears.
Mr. Carpenter refused to throw in the towel.
"We are here with a pretty sacred trust," he asserted,
"and it should not be treated lightly. In the months
and weeks to come many small matters of difference
can be argued out. This, to me, has been a very
profitable conference, and there is more nearly an
approach to a common accord than I had expected
when I arrived in Washington. It would be the height
of crime to the people who sent us here to adjourn
permanently now."
Somewhat reluctantly, Mr. Hoover agreed. He
suggested meeting later on in the spring to have
hearings beginning in the Southwest, which would
srart in Phoenix and go to California and come back
to Utah, Grand Junction, Denver and Cheyenne.
They lasted from March 15 to April 2, 1922. What
Hoover was hoping for was the emergence of a bona
fide leader who would come up with a position that
would allow the states - all seven of them - to
abandon their defensive posturing.
By the end of the Cheyenne meeting, Hoover
thought he had his man. Right after rhe Supreme
Court decision of June 5, 1922, in the Wyoming
case, Hoover asked Carpenter to prepare a compact
based on the 50-50 allocation of the water supply of
the Colorado River. Although he was extremely
pressed with ongoing negotiations with New Mexico
and Nebraska involving the South Platte and the La
Plata rivers, Carpenter managed to send off a
compact draft to Hoover in August. Whether he
believed it or not, he later told California's McClure
that the Wyoming verdict made his work on the
Colorado River much easier. "The decision stands,"
he told McClure, "as a precedent for the principle of
fixing the future rights of the states by allocation of
the water supply of the stream between them. I feel
greatly relieved and my work much lightened." What
he meant was that a permanent compact based on