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Show 82 WAR FOR THE COLORADO RIVER those laws had been improperly administered, declared Knowland, was no reason why California should be in- vited to secede. Now Downey appeared to reply to Fulbright. Declar- ing that the darkest and most unfortunate day in Cali- fornia's history was when the Bureau was brought into California's Central Valley, he told the Senate:56 "I cannot undertake to say what we shall do if the Con- gress or the President does not relieve us from this waste- ful, parasitical, subversive group." Downey 56 offered to supply documentary evidence to show a "condition of corruption which is almost incredi- ble. . . For that very reason the reclamation bill is now being held up in the House of Representatives. Committees have sent out investigators who have been developing the facts with regard to this willful extra- vagance." "We do not want the Bureau of Reclamation . to enter into Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, or any of the states where rainfall is sufficient for the purposes of cultivation," said Senator John H. Overton of Louisiana.58 "The people of Louisiana, despite the propaganda efforts of the Bureau of Reclamation, have seen the danger, and the senti- ment therefore is overwhelmingly opposed to exposing Louisiana to any such calamity." Such clashes on the floor of the Senate attracted the attention of correspondents, and stories went out over the wires. It was not a situation to which California found reason to object. Into the Senate hopper, Senators Downey, Knowland, McCarran and Mai one dropped Senate Joint Resolution 145, asking permission of Congress to make the United |