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Show HUNGRY HORSE PREDICTION 63 Attempts by the Upper Basin states and by Arizona to publicly discredit California officials were nothing new. It was a game which the sponsors of the Central Arizona Project and the crsp had long enjoyed. While waiting in December 1953, for hearings to begin in Congress, and apparently having nothing better to do, representatives of the Upper Basin resumed this ma- licious pastime by conceiving a scheme to attach scandal and disgrace to the name of Northcutt Ely, Washington counsel for the state of California. On December 2, 1953, Ely had received a telegram from Governor Knight requesting him to attend a meeting to be held the following day in the office of Attorney-general Brownell.74 According to Brownell, the conference had been requested by Governor Pyle of Arizona for the purpose of discussing Indian water rights in connection with the Supreme Court case of Arizona us. California. Ely attended. Also present were the Attorney-gen- eral; Governor Pyle; Jean S. Breitenstein, a Colorado lawyer; Assistant Attorney-general Tom Neighbors; Governor Mechem of New Mexico; and John Geoffry Will, attorney for the Upper Colorado River Com- mission. The legal discussions which took place are of no con- sequence in this narrative. It is enough to say that Pyle was forced to withdraw a proposal he had made when his own attorneys refused to support his position, and he had found himself at odds, not only with California, but with his Upper Basin colleagues.75 During the talk, Breitenstein expressed the thought that perhaps California would be willing to stipulate |
