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Show 290 INTERSTATE COMPACTS prior to commencement of such operation" and that "All reservoirs of the Middle Rio Grande project will be operated at all times in the manner described above in conformity with the Rio Grande com- pact, * * * and no departure from th& foregoing operation schedule will be made except with the advice and consent of the Rio Grande Compact Commission" unless, in emergency cases, life is endangered or the safety of major structures is affected. Litigation.-As a result of the conclusion of the 1938 Compact set out above, the Special Master appointed by the Supreme Court in the case of Texas v. New Mexico (296 U.S. 547 (1935), 297 U.S. 698 (1936), 298 U.S. 644 (1936), 300 U.S. 645 (1937), 302 U.S. 658 (1937), 308 U.S. 510 (1939))-a case based principally upon alleged exces- sive diversions of water in New Mexico in violation of the 1929 com- pact-recommended dismissal of the suit, costs to be divided equally between the two States. The Court confirmed the master's report and dismissed the complaint. Suit to enforce certain provisions of the Rio Grande Compact was filed in the Supreme Court by Texas in 1952. Texas v. Neio Mexico, Original No. 9, 343 U.S. 932. The special master's report of March 15, 1954 (347 U.S. 925) advised that "the absence of the United States, an indispensable party because of the rights of the Indians" called for dismissal of the suit unless Texas' prayer for relief were amended or unless "the existing situation" were found to be changed after an invitation to the Government "to submit a statement of its views as to its indispensability"; the plaintiff's motion for leave to amend the prayer of its complaint was referred to the special master (348 U.S. 805) who recommended January 31, 1955 (348 U.S. 946) that the prayer be granted and that, with the amendment, the United States be found not to be an indispensable party; argument on excep- tions to the report was set (349 U.S. 942); the United States was invited to submit its views on indispensability (350 U.S. 858) ; leave to amend was denied and the suit was dismissed in 1956 (352 U.S. 991). There was no opinion by the Court. In El Paso County Water Improvement District No. 1 v. El Paso, 133 F. Supp. 894 (D.C. W.D., Tex., 1955), "a contest over the rights to the waters of the Rio Grande River in the vicinity of El Paso" which involved, among other things, the effect of the United States' appropriation of waters in New Mexico for the interstate Rio Grande Federal reclamation project land the effect of internal Texas law on the use of water for that project, the count held (at p. 910) that the "bearing of the Compact on either the appropriation or the riparian rights claimed by the City raises a Federal question" and said (at pp. 907,909) : "The strongest bulwark of the plaintiffs' suit, in the present respect, is the Rio Grande Compact between Colorado, New Mexico and Texas. * * * This Compact has a number of peculiar provisions. For exam- ple, the water New Mexico must pass to Texas is delivered not where the two States meet, but at San Marcial, New Mexico, more than 100 miles above the point where the Rio Grande leaves New Mexico. This delivery is made into the reservoir of the Elephant Butte Dam, the principal structure of the Rio Grande Project. Some of this water eventually goes to Mexico. The Compact, instead of leaving the Texas |
