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CHAPTER I 3 In 1918. under a contract with the Imperial Irrigation District, the All-American Canal Board, chaired by Dr. Meade. recommended legislation which would authorize a high dam for the storage of Colorado River water and an All-American Canal to Imperial Valley. This led to the Kincaid Act in 1920 (41 Stat. 600) which authorized the Secretary of the Interior to make a study of the diversion and use of Colorado River waters. This resulted in the Fall-Davis Report in 1922, en- titled "Problems of Imperial Valley and Vicinity" (Senate Document No. 142, 67th Congress, Second Ses- sion). The report recommended the All-American Canal and a storage dam in the Lower Basin, rather than in the Upper Basin, as the best possible site for flood control, storage, and a power development nearest to the markets for power in southern California. Its data were also used by the negotiators of the Colorado River Compact. The Fall-Davis Report stated that the Colordo River problems"... are of such magnitude as to be beyond the reach of other than a national solution." And, finally, in 1924, the Weymouth Report spelled out the details of what soon became the Boulder Canyon Project. B. Colorado River Compact B.l Background The rapidly expanding use of Colorado River water in California was viewed with increasing alarm by of- ficials in the Upper Basin States. As a consequence of their concern, the League of the Southwest was organized in 1919 to promote the orderly development and equitable division of the waters of the Colorado River. Congress approved the Kincaid Act in 1920 (41 Stat. 600) directing the Secretary qf the Interior to make a full and comprehensive study and to report on the possible diversion and use of waters of the Colo- rado River. During the period when the studies by the Secretary were being conducted, negotiations were underway by the seven Basin States for an inter-State agreement on the waters of the river which led to the Colorado River Compact. While it was recognized that storage on the river was essential, the Upper Basin States faced the possibility that water conserved by storage would be put to use in the Lower Basin more rapidly than the Upper Basin could utilize its share of the normal flow and thus form the basis for Lower Basin claims of appro- priative rights in the water. Hence, the Upper Basin insisted that rights to some of the Colorado River flows be reserved for their future benefit. This could be done by a suit in the Supreme Court for equitable apportion- ment or by agreement of the parties, although the latter had never been used to allocate waters of an inter- State stream. B.2 Negotiations As a result of negotiations among the seven Basin States, it was agreed that an inter-State compact would establish an equitable apportionment of the waters and protect the Upper Basin States. Each of the seven Basin States adopted the authorizing legislation in 1921 and Congress consented to the negotiations by legis- lation enacted on August 19, 1921 (42 Stat. 171). The Colorado River Compact Commission convened in January 1922. Herbert Hoover, then Secretary of Commerce, was elected chairman. The Upper Basin's fears and the wisdom of the decision to attempt an inter-State agreement was demonstrated when the Supreme Court of the United States on June 5, 1922, in Wyoming v. Colorado, 259 U.S. 419, upheld the doctrine of priority of appropriations regardless of State lines. '~ 'i; , ~ ; B.3 Major Compact Provisions \ ff ,. After 27 meetings, a final agreement on the Compact was signed in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on November 24, 1922. Although the States had hoped to allocate the Colorado River waters among each of the seven' Basin States, such agreement was not possible. However, the Colorado River Compact did negotiate a historic document. It had the following major provisions: (1) Article I states the purposes of the Compact. (2) Article II(a) defines the "Colorado River System" as "that portion of the Colorado River and its tributaries within the United States of America."