447 



intangible benefits and costs. These interests were held by competing 

 economic groups, property owners, functional agencies, political juris- 

 clictions, competing exploitive users of water, and those with coniSict- 

 ing philosophies of political economy. 



The benefit-cost ratio appears to be central to many of these issues. 

 The collection, organization, and consideration of quantitative factual 

 information about costs and benefits is an essential element in decision- 

 making, in choices among various alternative approaches to the devel- 

 opment of particular resources, provision of particular requirements, 

 and applications of limited financial resources to new capital construc- 

 tion on competing projects. However it has rarely if ever been the 

 wish of the Congress to be guided exclusively by such quantitative 

 information. Many intangibles and qualitative values also need to be 

 considered. The relevant questions in the use of the quantitative 

 information seem to be: 



What relative weight it should receive, as against qualitative 

 values and considerations ? 



Whether a rigorous budgetary- screening process tends to over- 

 emphasize the quantitative values at the expense of intangibles? 

 ^ Whether a proper balance can ever be achieved as between na- 

 tional and regional interests that involve both tangible and in- 

 tangible benefits and costs ? 



"\'\niet]ier si^ecifif^. procedures traditionally used for evaluating a 

 particular value (such as irrigation or flood control) as a part 

 of total national expenditures continue to be suitable when in- 

 corporated into an analysis of all benefits and costs of a river 

 basin project (where it is, in effect, in competition with other 

 functions of development in that area) ? 



Whether, in dealing with entire basins, it is sufficient that the 

 total benefits outweigh costs, or whether each function should 

 separately pay its own way in full? (Or, conversely, whether one 

 paying function should be called on to subsidize a nonpaying 

 or deficit function ? ) 



Whether, indeed, the policies suitable in one river basin are 

 equally applicable to all? (Or, conversely, whetlier such consid- 

 erations as need for irrigation water, importance of pollution con- 

 trol in populous areas, and specialized water law, require adoption 

 of different policies peculiar to each particular river basin?) 



Or, more broadly, should requirements for water be served in 

 accordance with priorities established nationally or regionally? 



III. Senate In^-estigatiox Into ^^Tatioxal Water Policy 



The widening of the differences between the Congress and the White 

 House regarding water policy, and an asserted paucity of new starts 

 on water development, motivated a strong effort in the Senate to pro- 

 vide a sounder foundation for a national consensus in this field.*® A 



*« In the 84th. S5th. and 86th Congrresses. these rlifferences in outlook were notable. The 

 proposed Rivers and Harbors and Flood Control Act of 1956 (H.R. 12080) was (pocket) 

 retopd. Aner. 10, 1956. A similar bill, passed by Consrress in 1958 (S. 497) was aeain re- 

 .lected bv the President. Apr. 15. 1958, and was eventually modified to {rain his approval, 

 July ?j. A presidential "no new starts" policy was in effect. 1958-60, In public works appro- 

 priation requests by the administration, while Congress in this period repeatedly insisted 

 on the enlartrenient of water proiect budgets and plans. In 1959. the President denounced 

 congressional addition of 65 iinbudcreted new proiect starts, before siprning the Public 

 Works Appropriation Act : the act for 1960. which included 67 unbudjreted new starts, was 

 vetoed, slishtly modified, vetoed again, and overridden, Sept. 10, 1959. See Theodore M. 

 Scliad. "An Analvsis of the Work of the Sennte Select Committee on National Water Re- 

 sources, 1959-61." Natural Resources Journal. (August 1962), pp. 229-231. 



