COMMITTEE ON IRRIGATION AND RECLAMATION, The committee met at 10 o'clock a. m., Hon. Addison T. Smith (chairman) presiding. The CHAIRMAN. The committee will come to order. Mr. RAKER. Mr. Chairman, before we proceed to hear the witness I have a letter here from an engineer, who has had extensive experience as an engineer, and who was in the service at one time in California, and was a man of wealth. I met him on my return from California and he wanted to know my attitude on the Colorado River dam, and I told him that I had seen the conditions there several times and I had heard some witnesses on the subject, and I proposed to wait until I heard the balance of the testimony. Well, he wanted to expound his views on the subject, and I said that the thing for him to do was to come before the committee. He said he could not afford it; that he had given his services to the country and he thought he ought to have an opportunity to present his views on this subject. I said, "All right; we will let anything that is reasonable and proper go in the record; you write out your views and, whether I agree with them or not-that is wholly immaterial-I will submit them to the committee and ask that the letter go in the record." Now, these engineers will come here from all sides; and I feel that when you tell a man you will do a thing, irrespective of what you may think of it, you should do it; and therefore at this time I ask that I may be permitted to read this letter into the record; it is only three pages long; and also a letter from Mr. Arthur P. Davis, and his reply thereto, on the subject of silt. Or the letters may go into the record without reading. Mr. Davis is here and all of the other engineers will be coming here on this subject, and I would like to be able to keep my promise to this man. Mr. HAYDEN. He is the same man who has written every member of the committee. Mr. RAKER. It is Mr. George L. Dillman. Mr. HAYDEN. Yes: that is the man. The CHAIRMAN. In view of the fact that there are witnesses who wish to testify and leave the city immediately afterwards, if you wish to read that letter, Judge Raker, we could defer that. Mr. RAKER. I do not care to read it. The only point he raises is that the silt on the river will destroy a dam built anywhere on the river. The CHAIRMAN. If there is no objection, the letter will be inserted. in the record. Mr. RAKER. And I also call attention to a letter from Arthur P. Davis to Mr. Dillman and Mr. Dillman's reply to Mr. Davis. Mr. Davis is here, so that he can go over the subject of silt with the other engineers. (The letters referred to are as follows:) Hon. JOHN E. RAKER, M. C.. Washington, D. C. NOVEMBER 16, 1923. SIR: The Boulder Canyon Dam project of the Colorado River has been widely advertised as very desirable. It may come to your House Committee on Irrigation in some form this coming session. In the interest of economy, where we sometimes lack, this should be stopped before it begins. The Reclamation Service has always been badly advised. Every project has been a loser. The Government has lost. The blessing of poverty has kept me from participation there. The sad thing is that individuals have lost their savings, their investments, their faith, their labor, their hopes, sometimes their grip, their friends, their loyalty, their lives. This project will squander more money than all the other projects together. The dam proposed is higher than the two highest dams of the world, one on top of the other. Some dam, 690 feet high, 135 feet higher than the Washingren Monument. Water pressure of that depth is 21 tons to the square foot, or about 300 pounds per square inch. Some pressure, when authorities advise a maximum pressure on concrete in dams of 14 tons per square foot. A column of concrete that height would press on its foundation 531 tons per square foot, or 720 pounds to each square inch. Some weight. Building ordinances allow 40 tons in Denver and 60 tons in Boston per square foot for cut granite. Still, if it were desirable, the dam could be built. It is entirely undesirable, as being economically unsound, worse than the worst of Government reclamations so far built or started. Why? Because of inevitable silt. The Colorado River is the heaviest siltladen large stream in the United States. It is never clear. Conditions are ideal for maximum solid contents. Its bed and banks are friable, easily eroded, so easily that it has cut the greatest canyon on earth, over a mile in depth. It has available material-great fall, and great volume. Statements are made that the gold contents are about one-half of 1 per cent of its volume. They must have gotten the decimal point wrong and then some. There are no reliable measurements of solid contents of the Colorado. There is no method of making reliable measurements of solid contents of streams, save one-reservoiring. Any reservoir will capture most of the solid contents. Such a reservoir as Boulder Canyon will catch all of it. Silt intensity increases with the depth. Gravel and bowlders are rolled on the bottom and are missed in attempted measurements or allowed for in a conjectural way. The proponents say that the deposit of silt will be 88,000 acre-feet per annum. This silt originally discharged into the Gulf of California. The amount deposited, at that rate, would require over one million years. As the period of maximum glaciation occurred about 300,000 years ago, the average deposit must have been over 300,000 acre-feet per annum, probably much more. At any rate, 88,000 acre-feet deposit or one-half of 1 per cent of solid content, is an underestimate. It is several times that amount, probably 10, possibly 20; which means that the reservoir would lose its storage capacity rapidly, all of it in 20 years, possibly in 10 years. Note that the storage capacity is about the annual flow of the stream. Without regulation, the benefits to flood control, to silt control for Imperial Valley, to extended irrigation, will be nothing. The power possibility will be small. The total permanent benefit will be so small in proportion to expense that it is known now the investment will be almost a total loss. The problems of the Colorado River are not to be solved by a dam or dams. I attach copies of some correspondence. This is not a personal proposition, nor a local, but is a national economic problem. The solution proposed is entirely wrong. If I have not made myself plain, please ask questions. Don't ignore this communication. Help save the United States an initial fifty millions and an ultimate two hundred to five hundred million dollars. Very truly yours, Subject: Boulder Canyon Dam. GEO. S. DILLMAN. SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF., July 31, 1923. To the President of the United States and Others Interested in Governmental Expenditures and Economies. GENTLEMEN: You are asked to consider this circular when being advised, advising, or acting on appropriations for the Boulder Canyon Dam, storage, and power project on the Colorado River. The United States Reclamation Service has been badly advised from its Boulder Canyon is the worst yet. It will cost more than any other mistake, possibly more than all of them. start. Colorado River is the heaviest silt-laden large stream in the United States. For hundreds of miles above Boulder Canyon it flows through soft sandstones and clay shales so friable that it has cut the greatest canyon on earth, over a mile in depth. It is never clear. It is always cutting. It will so continue. Writing of the Rio Grande, the Chief of the Reclamation Service said, "All the water, both natural flow and stored, would carry from 10 to 15 per cent of mud." The Colorado is a similar stream, with greater fall and bigger flow. Say Mr. Davis's lower limit is right. The capacity of the reservoir is about the annual flow of the river. The reservoir would be silted full in 10 years. If Mr. Davis's estimate is 100 to 200 per cent too high, the time would be extended to 20 years. It is stated that silting will be at the rate of 80,000 acre-feet per annum. That makes the silt content about one-half of 1 per cent of the flow. This doesn't jibe with the other estimate of Mr. Davis. Nor does it jibe with the facts. The river is notoriously roily. Silt is its great problem. Imperial Valley diversion requires two dredges at the dam to keep the gates open. The problems of the Colorado, with its great volume. its great fall, the material of its bed and banks, are not solved by a dam. Some may want to know who signs this. It is an engineer, a Republican when he can be, who took troops to France in the late fracas, and is an advocate of economy in National, State, and individual affairs. Whether the dam is possible is another question. Hoping you will carefully consider. I am. Hopefully yours, It should not be built. GEO. L. DILLMAN. Mr. GEORGE L. DILLMAN, WASHINGTON, D. C., August 15, 1923. 11 Montgomery Street, San Francisco, Calif. MY DEAR SIR: I have by your courtesy received a copy of a circular of July 31, addressed to the President of the United States and others, in which I am quoted as saying that the waters of the Rio Grande carry from 10 to 15 per cent of mud. This statement, as you know, is removed from the context and conveys a different meaning from that intended. As you have quoted it and used it, you interpret it to mean that the stream in its natural state is carrying that percentage of mud; whereas the context of my statement shows that I made this statement as the amount which it would carry when being used under special conditions for sluicing purposes. This would be true of perfectly clear water. These observations show that the waters of the Rio Grande carry on an average but a small percentage of that above stated and that the Colorado carries a still less percentage. I hope you will have the fairness to correct this statement. You are entitled to your own opinions, but you are not entitled to distort mine. Yours very truly, A. P. DAVIS. SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF., August 23. 1923. Mr. A. P. DAVIS, 1653 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D. C. MY DEAR SIR: The percentage of solid matter a stream will carry depends on the availability of material, the velocity and volume of the stream. There is no exception. Nature's laws are not controlled by us. They are not matters of opinion. They are matters of fact. Neither for you nor for me will a stream carry a large amount of mud when we want it and refuse to carry it when we do not, under the same stream conditions. The conditions on the Rio Grande and the Colorado are quite similar. Except at low water and in flat spots, they are roily streams. They are roily for the same reasons, plenty of easily eroded banks and bottom, considerable fall and therefore high velocity. The velocity of the Rio Grande through the Elephant Butte Reservoir is not greater, nor its volume as great, as the Colorado. You have been quoted correctly. If there are errors, they are yours, not mine. I am entirely responsible for what I say. I feel no responsibility for your inferences or what you say. The Boulder Canyon project is a bad one. It should be stopped before money is wasted on it. Economy is a virtue little practiced in the United States. nationally, municipally, or individually. It is the one most necessary thing for this Nation, to-day more so than in the past. Hopefully yours, GEO. L. DILLMAN. The CHAIRMA. The first witness this morning is Mr. A. B. West. of the Southern Sierras Power Co.-—— Mr. LEATHERWOOD (interposing). Mr. Chairman, before the witness begins, there is a matter that I would like to bring to the attention of the committee at this time. Early in the hearings upon this proposed legislation, Mr. L. Ward Bannister, of Denver, Colo., appeared before the committee, and I think all of the members of the committee will agree that he discussed in a very interesting manner certain legal questions which are bound to arise in the further consideration of this legislation. I do not know whether his remarks before the committee have yet been printed or not. The CHAIRMAN. They have not been. Mr. LEATHERWOOD. But I find that he has written on the legal questions involved two most interesting articles. One appears in the January number of the Harvard Law Review of 1915 and is entitled "The question of Federal disposition of State waters in the priority States." The other article appears in the June number of the Harvard Law Review of the year of 1923 and discusses the question of "Interstate rights in interstate streams in the arid West." The last article to which I have called your attention deals in a very careful manner with both the Kansas-Colorado and the Colorado-Wyoming cases. It occurs to me, Mr. Chairman, that every member of this committee would be very greatly interested in this legal discussion. And while I appreciate that the hearings in the matter may be somewhat volumnious, at the request of one or two members of the committee, and others that I know are greatly interested in the matter, I am going to suggest that these two articles be printed. Mr. HUDSPETH. That is the only copy you have, is it not? Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Yes. I am going to suggest that these two articles be printed in the hearings upon this bill; and if Mr. Bannister's remarks have not already been sent to the printer and set up in type, that these articles may be inserted following his remarks before the committee, if it is possible to do so. I will submit the matter to the committee, for their action, with my personal request that these two articles be printed. Mr. HUDSPETH. I move that that be done. Mr. Chairman. Mr. HAYDEN. Let me make a suggestion: If you do that the articles will appear as an insert in the hearings. in very fine type, closely printed upon the page: so that it will be very difficult to read. The rule of the Joint Committee on Printing is that inserts in hearings shall be printed in that manner. I have found a way by which it can be printed in type that is readable. Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I will be glad to have your suggestion. Mr. HAYDEN. If you will ask to have the matter printed for the information of the Committee on Irrigation and Reclamation and have it appear, not in the body of the hearings, but in a separate pamphlet, you can get it printed in good type. And in that connection, Mr. Chairman, I will say that I have two or three legal articles upon this subject, which are not very lengthy, and one of which I mentioned to Judge Raker some days ago. I hope we can get the law in the case printed as a separate pamphlet, so that we would have it all together, and have it in type so that we could read it? Mr. LEATHERWOOD. The suggestions of the gentleman from Arizona are always helpful: and I am very glad to adopt his suggestion; and if the committee agrees to have these articles printed, I am going to leave it to you, Mr. Chairman, and the gentleman from Arizona to see that it is done in the proper manner. Just one word more: I have just one copy each of these two numbers of the Harvard Law Review, which I have obtained through the courtesy of a gentleman who prizes them very much: and after these articles are copied, I would like to have the maga zines back. Mr. HAYDEN. If you send them to the Public Printer, they will be torn to pieces. Mr. RAKER. The stenographer can have them copied. The CHAIRMAN. Yes; the reporter can copy them, and we can send the copy to the printer. Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I assumed that that could be done. Mr. HUDSPFTH. Now, Mr. Leatherwood, if the suggestion of Mr. Hayden is followed, would it not necessarily follow that those articles would be a part of these hearings? Mr. RAKER. They will be volume 1, 2, 3, or whatever the number is. Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I think, Mr. Chairman, that I have read nearly all the standard works upon the laws affecting the waters in the arid States, and I consider these two articles the most valuable that I have seen upon the subject. The CHAIRMAN. Without objection, the articles referred to will be printed in the manner indicated and will be printed as a part of the proceedings. Mr. SWING. May I ask, Mr. Chairman, at this time, that we make arrangement as to the hearing this morning? Former Governor Boyle, of Nevada, is here and has stayed here at considerable expense and has now been called home. He will probably be the only witness speaking for the State of Nevada, and I ask that the last half hour of the hearing this morning be reserved for Governor Boyle. I think we will adjourn promptly at 12 o'clock, on account of the bonus bill coming up. The CHAIRMAN. Yes. Mr. West and Mr. Phipps are here; and Mr. West has asked that he be allowed to proceed without interruption so as to conserve the time. Mr. RAKER. If you want to have Governor Boyle go on to-day, you had better make him the first witness: I just make that sugges |