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Show 178 WAR FOR THE COLORADO RIVER rarely invoked. Often a lone representative or senator conducted hearings without other members present. Engle explained that Knapp had been permitted to leave Washington, thus avoiding his cross-examination. That, he maintained, was unfair. Murdock had no alternative but to adjourn the hearing. April 6, 1949 Murdock resumed his program to show "the need aspect" of the project by summoning half a dozen witnesses, among them a Phoenix department store owner named Barry M. Goldwater, Alfred Jackson, an Indian from the Gila River Reservation, and more Arizona farmers. Several committee members promptly ducked out of the room, and at last only six remained to hear the testimony, but no one made a point of order about a quorum not being present. "I know of my own observation," said Goldwater, "that Central Arizona needs water from the Colorado River for a supplemental supply to irrigate lands now under cultivation, not to bring in new land, but to keep land now under cultivation from going back to the desert." 237 The statement established the pattern for the witnesses who followed him, and they adhered closely to it, con- suming most of the morning. Murdock did permit a small amount of technical testimony to be presented by K. S. Wingfield, an engineer from the Arizona Power Author- ity.238 The essence of Wingfield's statement was that power which would be developed by Bridge Canyon Dam would find a ready market in both Arizona and Cali- fornia, and that it could be produced considerably cheap- er than power produced by fuel plants in either state. |
