WSP04499

• File Number: 8271.300
• Description: Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Program - General Information and Publications-Reports
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Water Division: 5
• Date: 4/1/1964
• Author: Norris Hundley
• Title: The Colorado Waters Dispute
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Publication

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FOREIGN AFFAIRS

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ing of the treaty would be expressly clear and the United States need not fear
the adverse decision of a future arbitration tribunal. The treaty advocates
rejected this suggestion, insisting thatthe language Was clear enough. Though
it obviously was not, Downey failed to convince the Senate and on April 18,
1945, the treaty received a favorable vote of 76 to 10.
Though Downey had failed to convince the Senate that the treaty needed
clarification, subsequent developments in Mexico should have done so. In the
summer of 1945, the two Foreign Relations Committees of the Mexican
Senate conducted a series of "round table" discussions, in which interested
engineers and lawyers participated. Many expressed concern over the quality
of water Mexico might receive under the treaty, but officials urged them not
to worry. They insisted that the treaty provided sufficient safeguards against
Mexico receiving water too saline to be usable. One of the leading Mexican
proponent.B, Adolfo Orive Alba, cited article 27 to indicate that the Mexican
water was intended for irrigation. "Therefore," he concluded, "in this treaty,
as in any other of its kind, it is understood that the water must be of good
quality.'" Thi. meant, he asserted, that Mexico should receive water similat
to that uSed in the lower basin of the United States so long as it was "of good
quality for irrigation."
A reservation could have been attached to the treaty making the Mexican
position clear, but the Mexican officials realized the inadvisability of such a
move. They knew what the American negotiators had .aid about quality and,
consequently, anticipated that a reservation might cause the United States
to reject the treaty the second time around. Moreover, most of them appa~
endy believed ..bat if a controversy did ari.e which resulted in arbitration
no tribunal would permit the United States to give Mexico unusable water.
Satisfied, the Mexican Senate voted unanimously for ratification on Sep-
tember 27. .
California official. followed these debates with great interest. They noted
the wide divergence of opinion on the question of quality and had their Sena-
tors contact Secretary of State James Byriles about the discrepancy. But
Byrnes was surprisingly undisturbed by the report and curiously replied .that,
since Mexico had attached no reservations to the treaty, there was "no basis
for assuming that the two Governments entettain contrary views with respect
to any of the provisions of the treaty.'"
Why Byriles could take such a position in view of the obvious disa~ement
over interpretation is not easy to explain. Perhaps the reason lay partly in
ineptness and partly in his lack of good advice due to several important
shake-up. that had occurred in the State Department. While the treaty was
being negotiated and .igned, Cordell Hull had been Secretary of State. In
December 1944, Edward Stettinius, Jr., had replaced Hull. Then in July 1945,
shortly after the Senate had approved the treaty, ByrileB replaced Stettinius.
Changes had also taken place on lower but equally important leVl'Js of leader-

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'EI (1,.;"",,1)/, Mexico, D. F.. Aug. I, 1945. See also E"celsiM. Mexico, D. F., Aug. 10,
'945, and EI National, Me>cico, D. F., Aug. ". 1945. A translation of the remarks made by
Orive Alba on August 1 may be found iu Senate Documeut 98, 79th Cong., I8t Se.... 1945.
· James F. Byrnes to Sheridan Downey, Nov. '9, '945, in "Treaty with Mexico Relatiug
to the Utilization of the Waters of Certain Rivers" (Los An.geIes: California Colorado River
Board, n.d., 8 ..>, ".. 5.

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