BOARD00171

• Board Meeting Date: 4/19/1955
• Description: Minutes and Resolution
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

536

.

"First let me say the Water Board
consented to 'Wyoming foihing.:..ccilorado' in its
brief opposing the motion of the State
of California because their positions
were identical. Wyoming wanted to adopt
our brief. Utah and New Mexico have a
problem which is a little different from
that of Colorado and Wyoming because they
are in both the Upper Basin and the Lower
,Basin. Their principal interests are in
'the Upper Basin; they have some interest
in the Lower'Basin.' They filed their brief
adopting Colorado's argument as to why the:'
Upper Basin should not be in this law suit.
They argued that they should not be in even
as Lower Basin States. These motions were
"argued in Phoenix.

"The Master has not yet made his decision.
The arguments started on the 12th of April
and ended on the 15th. The arguments were,
to some extent, technical in nature and I ,
won't try to go into what was said. It was
very fully and capably argued by,California,
Arizona and the other states. I might say
that California had representation of some
'twenty-five or thirty lawyers. present, plus
a nU!!lber of engineers. .~Howe:ver; the argu-
ment was given by Brown of California and
Northcutt Ely, the special counsel. All of
the states presented their views.

"At t~e conclusion of the hearing, the
Master made some very pertinent remarks. All
through the course of the hearings, he in-('
dicated that this litigation need not cover
the long period of years that California has
indicated. At the conclusion of the hearings,
he made many remarks. I was unable to take
them down. We will, however, be able to
obtain a ,copy of a transcript of the proceedings.
My interpretation is that he intends to make
his recommendations to the Supreme Court as
soon as possible but he indicated that he
thought the Supreme Court would probably not
act on his recommendations until October
because it adjourns in June. We have a

I

I