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Show SULDEK DAM BILL 1 ASSAILEDBY UTAIIN cmpng that the Swing-Johnson der canyon dam measure is a dan-BU dan-BU 1S disho"est lld ""sound pro-i" pro-i" Representative Leatherwood 'a minority report setting forth jis views against its passage. .The project which it authorizes is cessary and would, if undertaken, a ' national scandal," Repre-tutive Repre-tutive Leatherwood said. "Congress 'ere asked to buy another white Iphant for taxpayers. A compara-'. compara-'. ly simple engineering job of flood mtrol and river regulation, which ould cost not more than ten or fif-L fif-L million dollars is made the ex-,se ex-,se for an unprecedented engineering 'xperiment costing not less than $125,-IxiOOO $125,-IxiOOO and risking at least $200,000,-COO $200,000,-COO more-" Leatherwood's views came after the ,.iiintr 0 a request by the house irrigation irri-gation committee asking immediate consideration of the measure in the touse. He was one of the two most rigorous opponents of the measure in committee. The Utah representative declared Hat, under the bill, "the federal government gov-ernment is not to stop when it has finished fin-ished the job of river regulation and 5ood control, but is to provide a hy-jro-electric power supply adequate for more than half the" present population of California, domestic water supply or ten million hoped-for but non-existent inhabitants of southern California Califor-nia cities, and irrigation canals for hundreds of thousands of acres of new alfalfa, cotton and corn land in the United States and water for hundreds hun-dreds of thousands of additional acres in Mexico. "Political pressure, and no genuine necessity; buncombe spread, by propaganda, propa-ganda, and not facts; log-rolling trades and not merit; all employed over a period of six years have placed the bill on the calendars of congress." Leatherwood charged that proponents propon-ents of the bill had never submitted their'case to impartial investigation. "Although this project has been condemned con-demned by three cabinet officers, two government bureaus, and highly competent com-petent private engineers, although it involves engineering and economic risks of unprecedented character, although al-though official criticism of its has been stifled and investigation of it by army engineers forbidden by law, congress now is importuned to immediately authorize au-thorize it, without provisions for further fur-ther investigation before it is actually undertaken," he said. "I challenge pro-ij pro-ij ionents of the biU to accept an amendment amend-ment making the project contingent upon approval by an impartial, capable, capa-ble, commission of qualified engineers and business men." The Utah congressman declared, al though it had been represented that one of the purposes of the measure was ratification of the Colorado river compact, in fact, there was no such compact to ratify, and "this bill threatens consummation of such a compact." He charged that the measure would legislate the United States into a bitter bit-ter lawsuit with one or more states "w.ould indefinitely delay all Colorado river development and would constitute consti-tute an attempt to over-ride and coerce these states and deprive them of most valuable rights and resources." He termed the project a serious encroachment en-croachment upon state control of state resources and declared it "delivers the future of the states into control of bureaucracy." The entire plan and purpose of the proposed construction, he said, is power pow-er development and he charged it would cost the government millions of dollars more than would outright necessary nec-essary expenditure for adequate flood control and river regulation. He denied de-nied Los Angeles and other southern California cities were dependent upon the water supply and declared there existed a serious disagreement between government engineers and private engineers en-gineers as to the feasibility of the project. "There are alternative means of providing all benefits and avowed objects ob-jects of the bill without expense or risk of this unprecedented undertaking," undertak-ing," he said. |