AZ vs. CA:10 California Exhibits, Vol. X; Nos. 458-528

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2 United States vs. State of Arizona. The Compact was made by California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming. Arizona was not a party. It was made to provide an equitable apportionment of the waters of the Colorado River system among the interested States, establish relative importance of different beneficial uses and secure the development of the Colorado River basin, the storage of its waters and protection against floods. After apportionment between defined basins lying above and below Lee Ferry and a declaration that the Colorado has ceased to be navigable for commerce and that the use of its waters for purposes of navigation should be subservient to uses for domestic, agricultural and power purposes, the Compact authorizes the waters of the system to be impounded and used for the generation of power and declares that use subservient to uses for agricultural and domestic purposes. It was approved by § 13 (a) of the Boulder Canyon Project Act and, by presidential proclamation, it took effect June 25, 1929. 46 Stat. 3000. The Act authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to construct a dam and incidental works in the Colorado at Boulder Canyon adequate to create a, reservoir having a capacity of not less than 20,000,000 acre feet "and a main canal and appurtenant structures located entirely within the United States connecting the Laguna Dam, or other suitable diversion dam, which the Secretary ... is hereby authorized to construct if deemed necessary or advisable by him upon engineering or economic considerations, with the Imperial and Coachella Valleys in California". § I.2 In a suit in this Court against the Secretary of the Interior and the States which were parties, Arizona unsuccessfully sought to have ratification of the Compact decreed to be unconstitutional and to enjoin construction of the Boulder Dam and the doing of anything under color of that Act. Arizona v. California, 283 U. S. 423. The bill alleges that February 10, 1933, the United States, acting through the Secretary of the Interior, entered into a contract with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. The District agrees to pay to the United States the entire cost of the dam, assumed not to exceed $13,000,000. By the use of this money the United States agrees that, under the Reclamation Act, June 17, 2By §§12 and 14 of the Boulder Canyon Project Act, the Beclamation Law-is denned to mean the Act of June 17, 1902, 32 Stat. 388, and Acts amendatory thereof and supplemental thereto, including the Boulder Canyon Project Act.