WSP04958

• File Number: 8200.300.40
• Description: Colorado River Compact
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Date: 8/1/1997
• Author: Daniel Tyler
• Title: Delpheus Emory Carpenter and the Colorado River Compact of 1922
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Publication

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38

believing instead that "Arizona's delay indicated that the Compact would
never be ratified and, therefore, the Federal Power Commission would be at
liberty to proceed without awaiting further ratiication by the states. ,,109
Carpenter was also concerned about events in Arizona, although he
consistently stated his belief that Arizona would ratity the Compact ifIeft
alone to do so. Governor George W. P. Hunt had been elected to a second
term in the falI of 1924. Hunt was an outspoken opponent of the Compact and
he had "insisted that the Compact should not be in effect until the three lower
states had entered into a separate agreement among themselves, requesting the
use of the water alIocated to those states in block by the Colorado River
Compact.,,11O Hunt's opposition and the apparent lack of pro-Compact
leadership in Arizona prompted Carpenter to suggest to Hoover and others
that "it might be well for the six states, which had already ratified, to take
legislative action, making the Compact effective when ratified by six ill ~
[states], thereby leaving the field open to Arizona to enter at her leisure. ,,111
As historian Norris Hundley, jr. has concluded, "[t]he state of Colorado
took the lead in trying to find a solution to the problem.',1I2 Governor William
E. Sweet authorized an investigation into the possibility of suing Arizona in
the Supreme Court. Fred S. Caldwell, Colorado's Assistant Attorney General,
enthusiasticalIy endorsed this approach. With the assistance of Denver's own
1. Ward Bannister, a man who frequently controverted Carpenter's plans and
policies, he planned to file suit with Colorado as the the lead plaintiff. 113
Carpenter bristled. He felt that Arizona had acted neither for nor against the
Compact. That state, he claimed, was entitled to ample time to make her own
decisions. The very object of the Compact, he told Sweet, was to avoid
litigation. CaldwelI was a "crusader," never satisfied unless he was involved
in a quarrel and someone "who has made a failure of everything he