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Show -95- most controversial and far-reaching of its kind. The decision involves the di- version of water from Lake Michigan at Chicago; the compact relates to the Colorado River. Thirteen States and one foreign country are interested in the one; and seven States and another foreign country in the other. The continental divide between the basin of the Mississippi River and that of the Great Lakes-St.. Lawrence waterway is but a few feet above the level of Lake Michigan where it crosses Illinois just a little way south of the City of Chicago* The area where that city now stands was naturally drained lakeward by the very short and sluggish Chicago River; while the long slope of the watershed is drained southward by the Des Plaines and the Illinois rivers into the Mississippi* Prior to the advent of railroads, and for more than a century since, Congress and the State of Illinois conceived and to- gether fostered the building of a canal, which was completed in a small way as early as the year 1848, connecting Lake Michigan and the Illinois River, and providing navigation by small water craft from the lake through the Chicago River and over the continental divide, with the aid of pumping stations located there. It cannot be doubted that in the beginning the federal govern- ment contemplated a much greater canal to provide passage for vessels of very substantial carrying capacity from the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River* discussed, have been omitted from this study. Consult; Joint Res. of June 30 1921, c. 38, 42 Stat. at L 1014. (Pennsylvania-Delaware boundary compact); Joint Res. of Sept. 22, 1922, c. 431, 42 Stat. at L. 1058 (Missouri-Kansas compact for joint waterworks for Kansas City, Mo*, and Kansas City, Kan»); Aot of Jan. 10, 1925, c. 70, 43 Stat. at L. 731 (New York-Connecticut water boundary compact); Joint Res, of Feb. 16, 1928, c. 87, 45 Stat. at L. 120; N. Y. Laws 1927, 0. 321; Vt. Acts. 1927, Act #139 (New York-Vermont compact concerning improvements in Lake Champlain). See also, Joint Res. of June 6, 1910, 36 Stat. at L. 881j authorizing Missouri and Kansas to agree upon a boundary line and to determine jurisdiction in the Missouri River. Not all decisions of the United States Supreme Court have been discussed. Consult: Georgia v. South Carolina, 257 U.S. 516, k2 Sup. Ct. 173, 66 L. Ed. 3U7 (I922) (Treaty of Beaufort, Savanna River); Albert Hanson Lbr. Co., Ltd- v. United States, 261 U.S. 581, 1(3 Sup. Ct. I4I42, 67 L. Ed. 8O9 (1923), aff'g 277 Fed. 89i+ (CCA* 5th Cir. 1922) (discussing intercoastal waterway project for building a canal from Boston to the &io Grande); Michigan v« YJi scon sin., 270 U.S. 295, I4.6 Sup. Ct. 290, 70 L. Ed. 595 (1926) (boundary line in Lake Michigan and other waters); Few Mexico v. Texas, 266 U»S. 5^6, I4.5 Sup. ct. 127, 69 L. Ed. I4.5I4, (1924), 267 U.S. 563, 69 L. Edo 799 (1925)> 275 U.S. 279, 48 Sup, Ct. 126, 72 L. Ed. 280 (I927), 276 U.S. 557, 72 L. Ed. 698 (1928), 276 U.S. 558, 1+8 Sup. Ct. 3I4J4., 72 L* Ed. 699 (1928) (boundary line in the Rio Grande); also, James Brown Scott, Sovereign States and ^uits, 267, where a, further list of cases between States is given. The war power of the United States over its waters has been purposely omitted from this study because it is contingent and temporary in the main, although as broad and all-pervading during the emergency as the situation may require--not different from the federal war power over all else within the borders of the nation. |
