OCR Text |
Show on the basis of plans submitted to Congress by the Department of Agriculture. The Water Facilities Act and the Wheeler-Case Act furnish additional examples of legislative provision for specified interrelationships of land and water. Congress has also provided for re- search and educational activities by various Fed- eral agencies important in this field. Other stat- utes provide means for financing land use work by private initiative. Several facts stand out in the foregoing sweep- ing summary. Excepting those statutes con- cerned with Federal lands, only the earliest in- volves any direct regulation of use of land. Only in recent years has the Federal Government as- sumed broad responsibilities for encouragement of proper use of non-Federal land. Promotion of conservation measures is sought by financial and other assistance. Emphasis is placed upon Federal-State-local cooperation, and much of the activity is conducted through local agencies. Comprehensive Development Comprehensive development, as applied to water resources and related land uses, may be defined as basin-wide development for optimum beneficial uses of a river system and its watershed. For, although the term is variously and incon- sistently used, it may fairly be said that statutes employing the term all move in the direction of that definition. Responsibilities assumed by the Federal Gov- ernment in the development, utilization, and con- servation of water resources are expressed in many statutes, passed at different times, devoted to separate phases of development, and adminis- tered by separate agencies. During the years when Federal functions were discharged through the construction of small, single-purpose projects, a fragmentary approach was sufficient. In recent year3, however, as the magnitude of river structures increased, the po- tentiality of their use for many integrated pur- poses became obvious. At the same time, there has been a growing recognition of the inter- relationships among structures on the same river system, of the fact that the storage or release of water at one dam directly affects the operation of downstream dams, of the fact that electrical and hydraulic integration permits a series of dams to do more than the same dams operated inde- pendently, and of the necessity for coordinating" the use of river structures for fulfillment of as many as possible of the sometimes conflicting" purposes for which the waters of the Nation may be used and controlled. And beyond the river itself, there has been an increasing awareness of the effect of land practices in the surrounding" watershed upon river flows and structures. This awakening sense of the need for compre- hensive development of our water resources has been accompanied by and reflected slowly in. changes in law and administrative practice. Growth until World War I.-The natural unity between a river system and its watershed has been, accorded varying and increasing recognition in. legislation dating back to the latter part of the nineteenth century. Thus, the relationship be- tween navigation and flood control was recog- nized as early as 1879, and an 1888 statute com- bined irrigation and flood control. Before the turn of the century, recognition was also extended, to the role of forest cover in preventing floods and preserving stream flow for navigation and irriga- tion by checking rapid runoff and reducing ero- sion and siltation. Likewise, and at about the same time, power development was added as a related purpose. In 1893, cognizance was taken of the effect of hydraulic-mining operations on navigability. This same period also saw Con- gress begin to exercise general control over ob- structions to navigation under centralized ad- ministrative regulation. And the jurisdiction of Congress to prohibit obstruction to the navigable capacity of navigable waters was sustained by the Supreme Court in 1899. Public interest in conservation and develop- ment of water resources increased with the turn of the century. The Reclamation Act was passed in 1902, and in 1906 was supplemented by provi- sions authorizing the disposal of water for mu- nicipal water supply and of surplus electric power. In 1907, a bill was introduced to create a com- mission to coordinate the activities of existing 295 |