State of Arizona, complainant v. State of California, Palo Verde Irrigation District, Imperial Irrigation District, Coachella Valley County Water District, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, City of Los Angeles, California, City of San Diego, California, and County of San Diego, California, defendants : the United States of America and State of Nevada, interveners : State of Utah and State of New Mexico, impleaded defendants : report / Simon H. Rifkind, special master

page 169

169 But not so the second phrase, for if the second is read literally she has no share in the uses specified in Article Arizona would have us read the second phrase literally so as to exclude California from the 1,000,000 acre-feet allotted, or as she says, apportioned, by Article III(b). But not so the first phrase. Arizona argues that Article III (a) of the Compact, despite its plain language to the contrary, was construed by the Congress and should now be construed as apportioning to the Lower Basin not System water but mainstream water. Nevada reads the language so that it makes no difference how the "surplus" language in California's limitation is construed. She argues that California can have no more than 4,400,000 acre-feet out of the available water in the mainstream, and since there is in fact no surplus, which Nevada defines as the excess over 10,000,000 acre-feet (8,500,000 acre-feet for the Lower Basin and 1,500,000 for Mexico), the question of how the language is to be read is moot. Nevada overlooks that her reasoning has in fact excluded California from so-called M(b) water. The United States once suggested a totally different reading". It construed the first mentioned phrase as if it read "apportioned to the lower basin states by paragraph (d) of Article III." Such a construction relates the phrase to the obligation of the states of the Upper Division not to cause a depletion of the River at Lee Ferry below an aggregate of 75,000,000 acre-feet for any period of ten consecutive years. The United States considers "surplus" to be "the waters in the main stream available for use in the Lower Basin in excess of 7,500,000 acre-feet per year."29 28That Article reads: "(b) In addition to the apportionment in paragraph (a), the Lower Basin is hereby given the right to increase its beneficial consumptive use of such waters by 1,000,000 acre-feet per annum." -9U. S. proposed conclusion 11.17.