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16 <br /> <br />CHAPTER TWO: LEGAL AND INSTITUTIONAL CONSTRAINTS <br />The Colorado River Basin has the lowest runoff per unit area of any major <br />drainage in the United States (U.S. Department of the Interior 1985,1987a), yet it <br />provides more water for consumptive use than any other river in the United States <br />(Pillsbury 1981). Water is in short supply relative to the many competing uses <br />within the Basin (Bishop and Porcella 1980). As a result, a body of legal and <br />institutional decisions governing the use of Colorado River water has developed, <br />know collectively as the "Law of the River" (Bishop and Porcella 1980). <br />The major legal constraints within the Basin include: the Colorado River <br />Compact of 1922, the Mexican Water Treaty of 1944, the Upper Colorado River <br />Basin Compact of 1948, and the Colorado River Storage Project Act of 1956. <br />Numerous other laws, compacts, and water projects impact upon water use in the <br />Upper Basin, the more prominant of which are included in Table 1. <br />The Colorado River Compact of 1922 provided for the division of water <br />between Upper and Lower Basin States, anticipated the eventual demands of the <br />Mexican Water Treaty, and imposed some restrictions on the amount and timing of <br />flows (Harris et al. 1982). Upper Basin States were apportioned 7.5 MAF per year <br />40