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<br />.. <br /> <br />IHI1825 <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />These are not completely satisfying answers. In theory, <br /> <br /> <br />if the Central Arizona Project were built, at the estimated cost <br /> <br /> <br />of more than ~l,OOO,OOO,OOO under a decree recognizing Cali- <br /> <br /> <br />fornia's prior rights to the water supply, California would <br /> <br /> <br />be protected. Conversely, if the decree were to recognize <br /> <br />the upper basin's apportionment, the upper basin would also be <br />protected, but we know that in the face of water shortage, de- <br />crees, compacts, contracts, and all manner of decisions embodied <br />in legal instruments are put to a severe test. <br />Mr. T. Richard Witmer, then an attorney for the <br />United States Department of the Interior, delivered an address <br />about two years ago in which he criticized, justifiably I think, <br />the rigidity with which many of the interstate river compacts <br /> <br />have been drawn: <br /> <br />"As they are written, nearly every one of our compacts <br />requires the same unanimous consent to amendment or <br />termination that it required for its formation. <br /> <br />"This, I think, is not good. A compact is and <br />should be regarded not merely as a contract between <br />two or more states. It should also be regarded, in <br />the eloquent phrase of the Colorado River states, as <br />a law of the river. Yet even contracts have their <br />escape hatches in the bankruptcy court and the divorce <br />court if things get too bad. And there has been no <br />law known to man since the law of the Medes and the <br />Persians which has not provided some means for its <br />amendment short of unanimous consent. We need some <br />escape hatch in the case of the compac~-some escape <br /> <br />37. <br />