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~ 21.02[1] MINERAL LAW INSTITUTE 21-6 Commerce Herbert Hoover, as their chairman, and spent parts of the next eleven months in devising a compact. The Compact divided the entire Colorado River system, in- cluding all tributaries, into an Upper and a Lower Basin. The boundary between the two was set at Lee's Ferry,13 which was considered to be a natural dividing point between the tributaries of the Upper and the Lower Basin states. At the heart of the Compact is the allocation scheme contained in Arficle III. Because of their pivotal significance to the sub- ject o~ this paper, Paragraphs (a) through (d) of Article III are set forth in full: (a) There is hereby apportioned from the Colorado River System in perpetuity to the Upper Basin and to the Lower Basin respectively the exclusive beneficial con- sumptive use of 7,500,000 acre feet of water per annum, which shall include all water necessary for the supply of any rights which may now exist. (b) In addition to the apportionment in paragraph (a) the Lower Basin is hereby given the right to increase its beneficial consumptive use of such waters by one million acres per annum. (c) If, as a matter of international comity, the United States of America shall hereafter recognize in the United States of Mexico any right to the use of any waters of the Colorado River System, such waters shall be supplied first from the waters which are surplus over and above the ago gregate of the quantities specified in paragraphs (a) and (b); and if such surplus shall prove insufficient for this pur- pose, then, the burden of such deficiency shall be equally borne by the Upper Basin and the Lower Basin, and when- ever necessary the States of the Upper Division shall de- liver at Lee Ferry water to supply one-half of the defi- ciency so recognized in addition to that provided in paragraph Cd). 13 Lee's Ferry, located in Arizona, had been a traditional river crossing point. Apparently prior to 1922 some or all of its inhabitants had resettled, and there was considerable confusion about its official site. Consequently, the Compact Commis- sioners decided to specify that Lee's Ferry would be considered to be one mile below the mouth of the Paria River, an Upper Basin tributary. Article Il(a), Compact.