Laserfiche WebLink
<br />002190 <br /> <br />16 <br /> <br />ARIZONA v. CALIFORNIA. <br /> <br />the Court has used the doctrine of equitable apportion- <br />ment to decide river controversies between States." But <br />in those cases Congress had not made any statutory ap- <br />portionment. In this case, we have decided that Congress <br />has provided its own method for allocating among the <br />Lower Basin States the mainstream water to which they <br />are entitled under the Compact. Where Congress has so <br />exercised its constitutional power over waters, courts have <br />no power to substitute their own notions of an "equitable <br />apportionment" for the apportionment chosen by Con- <br />gress. Nor does the Colorado River Compact control this <br />case. Nothing in that Compact purports to divide water <br />among the Lower Basin States nor in any way to affect <br />or control any future apportionment among those States <br />or any distribution of water within a State. That the <br />Commissioners were able to accomplish even a division of <br />water between the basins is due to what is generally <br />known as the "Hoover Compromise." <br /> <br />"Participants [in the Compact negotiations] have <br />stated that the negotiations would have broken up <br />but for Mr. Hoover's proposal: that the Commission <br />limit its efforts to a division of water between the <br />upper basin and the lower basin, leaving to each basin <br />the future internal allocation of its share." 35 <br /> <br />And in fact this is all the Compact did. However, the <br />Project Act, by referring to the Compact in several places, <br />does make the Compact relevant to a limited extent. To <br />begin with, the Act explicitly approves the Compact and <br />thereby fixes a division of the waters between the basins <br />which must be respected. Further, in several places the <br />Act refers to terms contained in the Compact. For ex- <br />ample, ~ 12 of the Act adopts the Compact definition of <br /> <br />"E, g., Wyoming v. Colorado, 259 U. S. 419 (1922); Nebraska v. <br />Wyoming, 325 U. S, 589 (1945), <br />as H. R. Doc. No, 717, BOth Cong., 2d Sess. 22 (1948), <br />