9373

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 9373
• Author: Water Education Foundation.
• Title: Western Water
• USFW Year: 1997.
• USFW - Doc Type: The Colorado River Compact
• Copyright Material: NO

construction of a dam by private
interests, which would enable the state
to tax the project and receive preferen-
tial power rates. In the end, the dam
was built as a public facility.
As for water supply, Nevada state
officials didn't believe a lot of crops
would be grown, estimating a need for
water for only 80,000 acres. "Any of
you who have visited Las Vegas in the
last few years know that we grow
money there and we do not grow
crops," said Richard Bunker, vice chair
of the Colorado River Commission of
Nevada, referring to Las Vegas' quest
for more water.
Arizona was an early supporter of
a compact, according to Rita Pearson,
director of Arizona's Department of
Water Resources, because it thought
such an agreement would determine
water allocations for each state and
protect its tributaries from California.
It didn't, and the state legislature
refused to ratify the Santa Fe pact.
"While Mr. Norviel did sign the
compact in November on behalf of the
state, by the time he got back home,
there was a great deal of controversy
as to whether or not the compact was,
in fact, a good idea for Arizona,"
Pearson said. "And he had to live
with the burden of being the signatory
on that compact for many, many years
to come."
The commissioners did not
anticipate the criticism of their efforts.
None of the states got everything it
wanted during the negotiations and
these absences attracted debate when
the state legislatures discussed ratifica-
tion of the compact. It was six years
before a six-state Colorado River
Compact took effect in 1929. Arizona
didn't ratify the pact until 1944.
"The ratification looked like an
opportunity to stop the compact,"
Pearson said. "It of course did occur,
but I do not think the [later] limitation
[on California] would have been
imposed if Arizona had ratified the
compact in its legislature back in the
'20s. So there is definitely a blessing,
to some extent, in our somewhat
disagreeable nature historically."

July/August 1997

The Law of the River
The Colorado River Compact is one
component of what is commonly
referred to as "the law of the river"; the
agreements, contracts, treaties, laws
and court decisions that regulate use of
Colorado River water among the seven
basin states, American Indian tribes
and Mexico.
In addition to the Colorado River
Compact, the subsequent components
of the law of the river include:
1. The Boulder Canyon Project Act
of 1928, which authorized construc-
tion of Boulder Dam (later renamed
Hoover Dam) and power plant and
the All-American Canal.
2. The Mexican Water Treaty of
1944, in which the United States
agreed to deliver 1.5 million acre-feet
of Colorado River water to Mexico
annually, except under surplus or
shortage conditions.

3. The Upper Colorado River Basin
Compact of 1948, which apportioned
the water among the upper basin
states.
4. The Colorado River Storage
Project Act of 1956, which authorized
several storage reservoirs and dams in
the upper basin and on tributary rivers.
5. The 1963 Arizona v. California
U.S. Supreme Court decision, which
resolved the lower basin apportion-
ment among Arizona, California
and Nevada.

The Colorado River near Moab, Utah.

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