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hearing in March, 1950, they sought to require the Secretary to turn down sufficient water to maintain the semi-annual runs of salmon. Peirson Hall, Federal District JUdge, denied an injunction and dismissed certain cases relating only to fish, and held that the fish were the property of the State and no one but the State could claim relief. Although the State had appeared in these hearings it had not taken a position. Thereafter, however, Attorney General Edmund G. Brown held that the law did not require water to be dis- charged from Friant Dam to maintain fish life if such a discharge would interfere with the primary objective of the Central Valley Project. In August, 1951, a new application was made for an injunction to require the Bureau of Reclamation to release the entire flow of the San Joaquin River from Friant Dam for the benefit of the riparian lands between the Dam and Mendota Pool. The United States Attorney, the California Attorney General, and attorneys for sixteen irrigation districts receiving water from the Madera and Friant Canals appeared in opposition. The Bureau was then turning down the river some 2,000 second feet of flow, when, in fact, the riparian land owners were using onlY about 100 second feet. The State, through Attorney General Brown, by Arvin B. Shaw, Jr., Assistant Attorney General, urged upon the court the desirability of a physical solution which would protect the riparian land owners in the amount of water they needed and at the same time permit the retention of as much water as possible at Friant Dam for the irrigation districts. It was agreed by all parties that an order might be entered permitting the release of 2,000 second feet, to be reduced when the Bureau had accomplished certain river channelization and other modifications. The hearing was continued to a date later in August. By that date it had become possible to. reduce the flow to 1,000 second feet. The State urged certain modifications of the re- straining order to improve the physical solution. The court modified the order and continued it in effect. It then ordered the case set for trial on January 15, 1952, and directed the engineers to confer on a permanent solution. It appears probable that ultimately the release of water from Friant Dam at Lake Millerton can be reduced to some 150 second feet. The Hollister Land Company seeks to obtain water for grasslands along the lower reaches of the San Joaquin River. It was intended in the plan of the Central Valley Project that the water rights of the grasslands area should be purchased by the United States in order that the water might be used for the higher purposes of irrigation along the Madera and Friant- Kern Canals. The government has spent over $5,000,000 in buying these rights. However, plaintiffs contend that they have left, nevertheless, some rights to the waters of the San Joaquin. The case has been set for trial at the same time as the Rank case. It is the position of the State, through Attorney General Brown, that if the grassland owners have any rights they must be justly dealt with, that is, they must be paid the value of their rights; but that the public objective of the State and Federal Governments in the Project, namely, the supply of irrigation water to lands, must not be defeated by litigation. Thus we see that in these cases the Bureau of Reclamation is being aided by the State of California. -13-