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<br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br /> <br />40 <br /> <br />the Compact] for a high dam.,,119 This time they had considerable political <br />support, including that of California's Colorado River Commissioner, W. F. <br />McClure. When the state legislature reviewed Carpenter's proposal, it <br />approved his draft bill but added on amendments stating that it would not be <br />binding on California unless the President certified that Congress would also <br />authorize construction of a dam at or below Boulder Canyon. <br />Carpenter was apoplectic. California's renewed insistence on dam <br />construction prior to the signing of a compact undermined everything he had <br />been working for on the Colorado River. At a conference of Upper Basin <br />states in Denver, a resolution was unanimously passed stating that any new <br />development on the river would be opposed until a compact in some form was <br />signed. 120 To Carpenter, California was playing "the baby act." The state had <br />"turned yelIow and backed out of [the Com pact] deal. Of the two states, <br />Arizona [was] the more to be admired, judged from the standpoint of action <br />taken." He believed that if California ceased its "childish tactics," Arizona <br />would someday recognize the need to ratifiy that document. 121 <br />But California was only part of the problem. Utah's legislature repealed <br />its approval of the six-state compact early in January] 927. Governor George <br />Dern explained that his state did not feel protected from Arizona. That state <br />along with California had vast acres of non-irrigated fertile land, he pointed <br />out, and would be under no constraint to take Colorado River water with the <br />objective of establishing a priority right. And Dern also worried about <br />Mexico. A dam at Boulder Canyon without another dam below it to regulate <br />the water released for irrigation, would be harmful to both basins unless a <br />treaty were first signed between upper states and lower states. Any attempt to <br />build Boulder Dam without a seven-state compact, Dern warned, would result <br />in "tremendous interstate litigation [which] would possibly last ten to fifteen <br />