| OCR Text |
Show COLORADO RIVER LITIGATION 549 oi! any part of the equitable share of the water decreed to Arizona pending its diversion and use by her shall not constitute a prior appropriation or confer upon the appropriating state any right in the water superior to that of Arizona. (4) That any right of the Republic of Mexico to an equitable share in any increased flow of water in the Colorado River made available by works being con- structed by or for California, shall be supplied from California's equitable share of the water, and that neither petitioner nor the de- fendant states other than California shall be required to contribute to it from their equitable shares as adjudicated by the Court. The proposed bill thus, in substance, seeks a judicial apportionment among the states in the Colorado River Basin of the unappropriated water of the river, with the limitation that the share of California shall not exceed the amount to which she is limited by the Boulder Canyon Project Act and by her statute, and with the proviso that any increase in the flow of water to which the Republic of Mexico may- be entitled shall be supplied from the amount apportioned to Cali- fornia. Our consideration of the case is restricted to an examination of the facts alleged in the p>noposed bill of complaint and of those of which, we may take judicial notice. The Colorado River, a navigable stream, see Arizona v. California, 283 U.S. 423, having a total length of 1,293 miles, rises in Colorado and flows through that state 245 miles, then through Utah 285 miles, then through Arizona 292 miles, then on the boundary between Ari- zona and Nevada 145 miles, then on the boundary between Arizona, and California 235 miles, then on the boundary between Arizona and Mex- ico 16 miles, and then through the Republic of Mexico to the Gulf of California 75 miles. For 688 miles, more than half its length, the river flows in Arizona or upon her boundary. Two dams have 'been built across the Colorado River by the Secre- tary of the Interior, acting under authority of acts of Congress. One, Boulder Dam, 378 miles below the intersection of the river with the boundary between Arizona and Utah, creates Boulder Reservoir, ex- tending along the bed of ttie river 115 miles above the dam. The other, Laguna Dam, is located 18 miles above the point where the Colorado River 'becomes the boundary between Arizona and Mexico. Two other (Jams are projected and in course of construction under contracts en- tered into by the Secretary of the Interior, pursuant to acts of Congress. Boulder Canyon Project Act, § 1; United States Session Laws, 1935, p. 1039; see United States v. Arizona, 295 U.S. 174. Both are in that part of the river which flows between Arizona and Cali- fornia. One, Parker Dam, is approximately 150 miles south of Boulder Dam, and. the other, Imperial Dam, is 4^2 miles above Laguna Dam. The average annual undepleted flow of the Colorado River in Ari- zona, at Imperial Dam, is approximately 16,840,000 acre feet.1 Of the total undepleted flow approximately 6,100,000 acre feet per annum have been appropriated and put to beneficial use in the United States 1 At Lees Ferry, twenty-three miles below the point where the river enters Arizona from Utah, the average undepleted annual flow is 16,660,000 acre feet. At Boulder Dam it is 17,720,000 acre feet. At the Imperial Dam it is 16,840,000. Non-diversion river losses and evaporation below Lees Ferry aggregate 1,400,000 acre feet annually and are about offset by the river's gains between Lees Ferry and Boulder Dam. |
