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Aspinall would become known as the environmental movement's most stubborn opponent for his unstinting advocacy of public land and reclamation prerogatives in the face of environmentalist criticism.1z Both Edward Taylor and Aspinall shaped the Mountain West's irrigation infrastructure as well as its reclamation political values. Taylor's contributions were several. He provided a model for later politicians in terms of constructing a political career based upon hydraulic values. "Fight for every drop of water that originates on the Western Slope," was Taylor's clear message. Because of the Western Slope's small population, its political power would always be minimal. One way to maximize its political leverage was to find key Congres- sional committee assignments where political strength could be exerted. Wayne Aspinall, who grew up idolizing Taylor, took the older man's advice to heart. Aspinall became the nation's foremost authority on rec- lamation politics, a master legislative technician, and the environmental movement's "most durable foe. "13 Together, Aspinall, Taylor and the story of the Colorado River Storage Project bear witness to some of the most significant reclamation developments in twentieth cen- tury Western American history. The strategies and lega- cies of both men addressed the needs of a region where water needed to be managed. As the citizens of Colo- rado and the larger American West in the twenty -first century continue to debate the merits of additional water storage, or perhaps revisit the Colorado River Compact, or devise other water division strategies, they will be doing so in the shadow of the political precedents and visions articulated by water statesmen like Edward Taylor and Wayne Aspinall in the early to mid- twentieth century. (Endnotes) 'Daniel Tyler, Silver Fox of the Rockies: Delphus E. Carpenter and Western Water Compacts (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1993), 9. 'Duane Vandenbusche and Duane A. Smith, A Land Alone: Colora- do's Western Slope (Boulder, CO: Pruett Publishing Company, 1981), 190 -91. 'Steven C. Schulte, `Building the Vision: Taylor, Aspinall, and Water for Western Colorado, 28 -31 in Colorado Foundation for Water Edu- cation, Citizen's Guide to Colorado's Water Heritage (Denver, CO: Colorado Foundation for Water Education, 2004). 4Ibid. 5See Daniel Tyler, The Last Water Hole in the West: The Colorado - Big Thompson Project and the Northern Colorado Water Conser- vancy District (Niwott: University Press of Colorado, 1992). 'Schulte, `Building the Vision," 28 -31. 'Steven C. Schulte, Wayne Aspinall and the Shaping of the Modern West (Boulder, CO: University Press of Colorado, 2002). See espe- cially Chapter One, 1 -36. $Ibid., 37 -83. 'See Richard White, It's Your Misfortune and None of My Own: A New History of the American West (Norman: University of Oklaho- ma Press, 1991), 503 -04. White points out that eight million people migrated across the Mississippi between 1940 and 1950. Of the nine states with the highest rates of population growth between 1940 and 1950, six were in the American West. Also see White's population table, 515. "Hal K. Rothman, The Greening of a Nation ?: Environmentalism in the United States Since 1945 (Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1998), 36. 11See Mark W.T. Harvey, Symbol of Wilderness: Echo Park and the American Conservation Movement (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1994). Harvey tells the Echo Park story well and places it in the context of both environmental and Western American history. "Schulte, Wayne Aspinall, 227 -260. "Ibid. ......__ _....... 27