Statement by U.S. Senator Thomas H. Kuchel

Statement by U.S. Senator Thomas H. Kuchel before the subcommittee on irrigation and reclamation of the Committee on Interior and Insular Affaris, United States House of Representatives on the Lower Colorado River Basin Project Legislation, Monday, August 23, 1965, page 6-6- On June 3, 1963, the Supreme Court rendered its long-awaited decision in Arizona v. Californi, 373 U.S. 546, the suit which Arizona had brought to clear title to sufficient water for the Central Arizona Project. The Court's decree undertook to divide among Arizona, California and Nevada 7.5 million acre-feet of the annual consumptive use of the waters of the main stream-- 4.4 million to California, 2.8 million to Arizona, 300,000 to Nevada and awarded one-half the surplus to California, one-half to Arizona and Nevada. But the Court refused to rule on the question of how shortages should be borne in the event there was insufficient water in the main stream of the Colorado River to satisfy 7.5 million acre-feet of consumptive use per annum, a situation which will prevail on the Lower Colorado within a few decades. The Court left the allocation of such shortages to the Secretary of the Interior, but said specifically that Congress might legislate what it considered to be an equitable shortage formula, thus taking the matter out of the Secretary's hands. Thereafter, the Arizona delegation introduced bills to authorize the Central Arizona Project. When Senate hearings were held on the Central Arizona Project bill by the Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee in April, 1964, I introduced an amendment, drafted by the Attorney General of California, which would protect all existing projects in Arizona, Nevada and California against the new uses which would result from construction of the Central Arizona Project. Even though California is now using 5.1 millionEpson Perfection 4870 Photo, 400 dpi, 24 bit, 1,462,987 byte