Letter on Failure of Department of the Interior to Report on the Central Arizona Project

Letter: From Carl Hayden, to Stewart Udall, February 7, 1964, page 3-3- The failure of your Department to answer my questions relating to certain aspects of the regional plan has left me in the dark as to your intentions and has handicapped Congressional consideration of related questions. My letter of October 4, 1963, requested information on a number of specific aspects of the regional plan in relation to a then-pending appropriation bill. I again asked those questions by letter of November 1, 1963, and I have as yet to receive a reply. In response to my letter of December 19, 1963, urging submission of the Central Arizona Project report, you wrote back that to do so would in your opinion be breaking your commitment to Governor Brown and the California Delegation, as well as to the other three lower basin states. I would like to remind you that I was not consulted about such commitments nor was I a party to them. I consider the promise you made to me in January 1963 to have the Central Arizona Project report ready as soon as the Supreme Court decision was announced as a prior binding commitment that should also receive your careful consideration. As an elected representative of the people of the State of Arizona, I will continue to feel that I can do no less than my utmost to secure enactment of the Central Arizona Project as soon as possible. It would be a great blow to the people of the State of Arizona to lose the legislative battle after succeeding in long and arduous litigation. I again request that you cause your Department's favorable report on the Central Arizona Project to be forwarded to the Interior and Insular Affairs Committee. If this request is again turned down I will be obliged to inform the people of the State of the status of their efforts to bring this desperately needed supplemental water supply to the critical areas of our State. Regrettably, failure to secure favorable action in the present Congress may make necessary resort to legislative strategy that might be wasteful of the resources of the region and the nation. Yours very sincerely, U.S.S.Epson Perfection 4870 Photo, 400 dpi, 24 bit, 2,847,679 byte