If, as the Secretary of State holds, there is no treaty prohibiting the United States from taking the waters of the Colorado River, and if Mexico has no right to subject the United States to the burden of arresting its development and denying to its inhabitants the use of a provision which nature has supplied entirely within its own territory, and if such a right would be inconsistent with the sovereignty of the United States over its national domain, why should he now advocate upon "considerations of equity and comity" a division of the waters of said river between the United States and Mexico? Mexico has not requested such a division. In fact and indeed Mexico has acquiesced in our interpretation of the treaties and no longer claims any right to object to diversions made within the United States. In the report of the proceedings before your committee on this bill will be found a reference to a report of Engineer De la Garza made to the Mexican minister fomento January 23, 1912, in which it is stated:

"The Republic (Mexico), however, can not prevent the waters from being taken in American territory, but has a perfect right to prevent the waters taken in American territory from being carried across the Mexican territory," etc. This situation, namely, the carrying of water through Mexican territory, is the very thing the citizens of Imperial Valley are trying to get away from, and the bill now before your committee above referred to will, if enacted into law, accomplish this result.

Does it not appear to the committee strange that Mexico has never asked for a treaty dividing the waters of the Colorado River, or for an agreement dividing those waters upon "considerations of equity and comity" or otherwise?

Does it not also seem strange that, in view of our treaty rights and the opinions of the legal department of the United States Government upholding them, any citizen or official of the United States should suggest a treaty or agreement by which to give away the waters of the Colorado River to the detriment of the citizens of the United States and in violation of their property rights?

For whom should the Secretary of State be asking equity? For the citizens of the United States within the United States, or for a number of renegade millionaire Americans in a foreign country?

The Secretary of State appears willing to waive the legal right of the United States to the waters of the Colorado River. Thereby the millionaire Americans referred to would enjoy the use thereof under a foreign flag.

I note the Secretary's reference to the Rio Grande case and in that connection desire to say:

Why did the Secretary of State cite a case which was ended adversely to the interests of the United States, unless it was an attempt to strengthen his suggestion that the water be divided between the United States and Mexico? The iniquity of the Rio Grande case was pointed out by Senator Thomas of Colorado in 1914, and I will later in this communication quote from his speech. Suffice it to say at this time that the able Senator looked with prophetic eye upon the Colorado River question, for he said, in reference to the Rio Grande case:

"If the Government can take the waters of our State for a project like this, then it can enter into similar relations with Mexico concerning the peninsula of Lower California with reference to the waters of the Colorado River, and lay a like inhibition upon the States where the sources of that great river are found."

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The Secretary of State says that the United States, following the delivery of the opinion of the Attorney General above referred to (vol. 21, Opinions Attorneys General, pp. 274–283), decided upon the adoption of a liberal policy and one not involving insistence on its legal rights. This is news to me. deny that any such policy was adopted by the United States, and in support of this denial, refer the committee to the convention referred to by the Secretary of State (Treaty of May 21, 1906), wherein it is set forth: "Nor does the United States in any way concede the establishment of any general principle or precedent by the concluding of this treaty" (see Art. V). Did not Mexico, by ratifying this treaty, and particularly the portion thereof above quoted, preclude herself from again objecting to the United States putting to beneficial use waters which rise wholly within her border? But not that alone would control, for it is well settled that, as stated by Attorney General Harmon in his opinion above referred to, "The fundamental principle of international law is the absolute sovereignty of every nation as against all others

within its own territory." From this principle the United States has never deviated, and that it intended to make this clear in the treaty of 1906 is evident from the use of the language above quoted which expressly states that she does not concede the establishment of any general principle or precedent which might be inferred from her signing of the said treaty.

That Mexico was precluded from setting up any precedent was evidently the opinion of Congress, for it passsed an act providing for the construction of the Laguna Dam in the Colorado River. which dam has been constructed and in conjunction with which the United States has expended nine millions of dollars in the Yuma reclamation project immediately north of the boundary line between the United States and Mexico. In addition, the Department of the Interior entered into a contract with the Imperial irrigation district October 23, 1918, under which the district was to construct the canal the financing of which is provided for in the bill now before your committee and providing for the making of the first payment December 31, 1919. If the amendment suggested by the Secretary of State be adopted, the Government would be guilty of interfering with its own contract and stopping the carrying out of provisions which it itself inserted therein under the provisions of an act of Congress. In addition, the Government, under the reclamation act, has expended approximately one hundred millions of dollars on reclamation projects which obtain their water from the Colorado River and its tributaries. Therefore, we find two branches or departments of the Government-Congress and the Department of the Interior-upon the advice of another branch-namely, the Department of Justice providing, at an expense to the people of the United States of many millions of dollars. the utilization of the entire Colorado River for the purpose of developing the agricultural resources of our own country, and another branch— the Department of State-while apparently agreeing with the opinion of the Attorney General as to our legal right, suggesting a division of the waters of the said river, which supply many unfinished projects, and deliberately giving it in effect to a few millionaires in a foreign country. This could not be done without great injury to United States governmental and private irrigation enterprises.

If the amendment and policy suggested by the Secretary of State be adopted, such action would not only stop all development on the Colorado River and deprive the citizens of the State from which that great river receives its water supply of their right but it would enable Mexico to hold up any settlement or solution of the Imperial Valley problem until the private interests referred to could divert and put to beneficial use the entire flow of water from the Imperial Valley main canal, which traverses Mexican territory for 60 miles, and thereby turn one of the richest agricultural districts in the United States into a desert, deprive 60,000 American citizens of their homes and their property and the Nation of an annual output of food valued at this time at approximately fifty millions of dollars. The Rio Grande case can not properly be used as a precedent for action of a similar nature in the Colorado River case. The former is distinguished from the latter particularly because when all of the territory acquired by the United States under the treaty of 1848 was Mexican territory, and indeed as long ago as 200 years previously, the waters of the Rio Grande were diverted and used for irrigation by Mexicans living below the present boundary line at that point, and these Mexicans had a perfect legal right up to the date of the treaty of 1848 to divert and use the said waters, the sources of which were then in Mexican territory, which right had existed for several hundred years. In the Colorado River case, conditions as to the actual use of water in Mexico are absolutely different. Previous to 1904 no one had used the waters of the Colorado River for irrigation purposes in Mexico, and since that date there has been no irrigation in Lower California (Mexico), excepting by the use of water diverted in the United States and at the sole cost of the American farmer.

In addition, all the canals which deliver water to Mexican lands were constructed with moneys provided by American farmers, and said canals were built for the purpose of carrying American water through Mexico and back into the United States, not for the purpose of delivering water to Mexico or Mexican lands. The water taken by the interests below the line was in the form of toll exacted by those interests for the right on the part of United States farmers to carry their water through Mexico on to their own lands in the United States. Many years previous to 1904, the United States had twice. served notice upon Mexico, once in the Rio Grande case through opinion of Attorney General Harmon, and once through opinion of Special Assistant Attorney General Burch in the Colorado case, both being in response to protests

If, as the Secretary of State holds, there is no treaty prohibiting the United States from taking the waters of the Colorado River, and if Mexico has li right to subject the United States to the burden of arresting its developme and denying to its inhabitants the use of a provision which nature has s plied entirely within its own territory, and if such a right would be ine sistent with the sovereignty of the United States over its national domain. ! should he now advocate upon "considerations of equity and comity" a divis of the waters of said river between the United States and Mexico? Mes has not requested such a division. In fact and indeed Mexico has acquie in our interpretation of the treaties and no longer claims any right to o to diversions made within the United States. In the report of the pr ings before your committee on this bill will be found a reference to a re of Engineer De la Garza made to the Mexican minister fomento January 1912, in which it is stated:

"The Republic (Mexico), however, can not prevent the waters from taken in American territory, but has a perfect right to prevent the wate in American territory from being carried across the Mexican territory, This situation, namely, the carrying of water through Mexican re the very thing the citizens of Imperial Valley are trying to get away the bill now before your committee above referred to will, if enact»» accomplish this result.

Does it not appear to the committee strange that Mexico has · for a treaty dividing the waters of the Colorado River, or for a dividing those waters upon "considerations of equity and comi wise?

Does it not also seem strange that, in view of our treaty r opinions of the legal department of the United States Governu them, any citizen or official of the United States should sugge agreement by which to give away the waters of the Coloratio detriment of the citizens of the United States and in violation of rights?

For whom should the Secretary of State be asking equity? I of the United States within the United States, or for a numbe millionaire Americans in a foreign country?

The Secretary of State appears willing to waive the lega. United States to the waters of the Colorado River. Thereby Americans referred to would enjoy the use thereof under a fon I note the Secretary's reference to the Rio Grande case a nection desire to say:

Why did the Secretary of State cite a case which was enc the interests of the United States, unless it was an attempt suggestion that the water be divided between the United Stac The iniquity of the Rio Grande case was pointed out by Sec Colorado in 1914, and I will later in this communication speech. Suffice it to say at this time that the able Sena prophetic eye upon the Colorado River question, for he said, the Rio Grande case:

"If the Government can take the waters of our State i this, then it can enter into similar relations with Mexico conc sula of Lower California with reference to the waters of the and lay a like inhibition upon the States where the sources o are found."

The Secretary of State says that the United States, follo of the opinion of the Attorney General above referred to i Attorneys General, pp. 274-283), decided upon the adoption and one not involving insistence on its legal rights. This deny that any such policy was adopted by the United Stat of this denial, refer the committee to the convention refer tary of State (Treaty of May 21, 1906), wherein it is si the United States in any way concede the establishment ciple or precedent by the concluding of this treaty Mexico, by ratifying this treaty, and particularly the p quoted, preclude herself from again objecting to the U to beneficial use waters which rise wholly within her bo alone would control, for it is well settled that, as stated Harmon in his opinion above referred to, "The fundamer t national law is the absolute sovereignty of every nation

made by Mexico to the diversion of the waters on United States soil, that such diversion was well within the treaty and sovereign rights of the United States. Then, in May, 1906, Mexico acquiesced in this position as I have shown, following which in 1912 it took the position that she could not prevent the waters being taken in American territory, the only thing she could prevent being to prevent waters taken in American territory from being carried across Mexican territory.

The Secretary of State supports his suggestion regarding a division of the water of the Colorado River with Mexico by a reference to the treaty of 1906 and the case of the United States v. Rio Grande Dam and Irrigation Co. (174 U. S., 690). I desire to call attention to the fact that this is the same treaty and the same case referred to by United States Senator Charles S. Thomas, of Colorado, in his speech delivered in the Senate March 23 and 24, 1914, wherein among other things he said:

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Now, Mr. President, that treaty upon its face is an ordinary engagement between two sovereign powers, one of which engages to settle certain controverted local matters between them by furnishing and delivering at its own expense for all time 60,000 acre-feet of water to the other. It is, in fact, the consummation, Mr. President, of a sordid, shameful, and successful intrigue, conducted in the interests of private parties impelled by greed and gain, based upon the existence of no legal, equitable or moral claim whatever on the part of the Mexican Government or any of its citizens against this Government or any of its citizens.

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"I have referred to the fact that the treaty requires the United States to furnish annually as a maximum of only 60,000 acre-feet of water to Mexico to satisfy and compromise controversies growing out of the use of waters of the Rio Grande in the United States for agricultural and other purposes. I want to emphasize at the outset the proposition that these claims of the people of Mexico were absolutely groundless. * * *

"I propose to show before I get through that not only has the treaty power of the Government been successfully utilized or perverted so as to carry out this scheme, but the purpose and funds of the reclamation law and project are being utilized and perverted to the same end. * * * Mr. President, I do not hesitate to brand this treaty scheme as a huge speculative enterprise conceived by greed and fostered by governmental agencies; a scheme the needs of which are out of all proportion to the ends finally accomplished in its name. ** What I complain of, Mr. President, is that in this general scheme of Anson Mills the rights of the people of New Mexico, the rights of the people of Colorado, and, indirectly, the rights and interests of the people of the United States were not only ignored but wantonly sacrificed. * * *

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"The Government, Mr. President, has no power to take the property of the citizen without making compensation, yet on the 5th day of December in 1896 it laid its interdict upon the people of my State and forbade them the use of any of the flood waters of this great river, except those which had been previously appropriated. This action has arrested the growth and development of the great San Luis Valley. * But the project (referring to Wagon Wheel Gap) has been paralyzed for 18 years, to the end that the Government of the United States through a treaty whose history is a scandal and a shame may give to the people of the Republic of Mexico 60,000 miserable acre-feet of water every year for 25,000 acres of land at a cost of $10,000,000, plus the reimbursement of the money expended by the Rio Grande Dam & Irrigation Co., plus this tremendous loss that is inflicted upon the people of my State. ** * *

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"It is the most preposterous, the most expensive, the most indefensible enterprise of the sort that this or any other country ever attempted, and its outrageous progress is attended by delay in the completion of reclamation projects throughout the West-in Washington, in Wyoming, in Utah, in Colorado, in Arizona-because the millions of money belonging to the reclamation fund and needed for them are being diverted for the completion of this mad and senseless project. Mr. President, I trust I have said enough to impress those who have done me the honor to listen to me with the magnitude and importance of the subject locally. Certainly in these days no man need argue the proposition that whatever benefits or injures one of our 48 sovereignties also benefits or injures the rest of the United States. If the Government can take the waters of our State for a project like this, then it can enter into similar relations with Mexico concerning the peninsula of Lower California with reference to the waters of the