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Show Appendix J THE U. S. SUPREME COURT CASE OF ARIZONA VS. CALIFORNIA AND ITS RELATIONSHIP TO THE UPPER COLORADO RIVER STORAGE PROJECT In 1955, when the states of the Upper Colorado River Basin launched their drive to secure approval by Congress of the crsp, the case of Arizona vs. California had been in the U. S. Supreme Court since 1952. These three years had been consumed by preliminary legal skirmishing and a delay caused by the death of the Special Master appointed by the court to hear evidence. The second Special Master appointed was the New York attorney and former federal judge, Simon F. Rifkind, who held hearings in San Francisco. Thus, California was engaged simultaneously in defending its Colorado River water rights on two fronts. For the crsp congressional testimony, Northcutt Ely of Washington, d. c, had been named chief counsel for California by Governor Edmund G. Brown. Of the two-front war, Ely wrote: The people of California have invested about three-quarters of a billion dollars in works which are dependent upon the waters of the Colorado River system. From north to south these are: Hoover Dam, whose cost was underwritten by the water and power users of Southern California, plus the transmission lines built by California agencies to bring Hoover Dam power to the people in that State; Parker Dam, about 155 miles below Hoover Dam, paid for by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California; The Colorado River Aqueduct, built and paid for by the Metropolitan Water District, which carries Colorado River water over five hundred miles from Parker Dam to some 66 |