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Show 64 The reason for judicial caution in adjudicating the rela- tive rights of States in such cases is that, while we have jurisdiction of such disputes, they involve the interests of quasi-sovereigns, present complicated and delicate questions, ar:d, due to the possibility of future change of conditions, necessitate expert administration rather than judicial imposition of a hard and fast rule. Such con- troversies may appropriately be composed by negotia- tion and agreement, pursuant to the compact clause of the federal Constitution. We say of this case, as the court has said of interstate differences of like nature, that such mutual accommodation and agreement should, if possible, be the medium of settlement, instead of in- vocation of our adjudicatory power. Interstate Compacts The Constitution of the United States provides that:279 No State shall, without the consent of the Con- gress, * * * enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State * * *. The Supreme Court has said that it discerns no difference be- tween "compact" and "agreement," except that the former is generally used with reference to more formal engagements. Compacts and agreements cover "all stipulations affecting the conduct or claims of the parties." 280 Nor does the Constitu- tion "state when the consent of Congress shall be given, whether it shall precede or may follow the compact made, or whether it shall be expressed or may be implied." 281 Noteworthy in this connection is the fact that, in 1911, Con- gress gave blanket consent to the states for compacts "for the 879 U. S. Const., Art. I, § 10, cl. 3. This provision apparently seemed de- sirable to the framers of the Constitution and evoked little comment, either in the Convention debates or in The Federalist papers. See Barron V. Baltimore, 7 Pet. 243, 248 (U. S. 1833) ; I Bryce, The American Common- wealth, 326 (1941) ; Madison in The Fedeeaust, No. 44. 280 Virginia v. Tennessee, 148 U. S. 503, 520 (1893). 881148 U. S. at 521. See also Wharton v. Wise, 153 U. S. 155,173 (1894). |