SHALL WE HAVE "THE DENVER COMPROMISE?" 



BY WILLIAM E. SMYTHE. 



THE Third National Irrigation Congress at Den- 

 ver, September 3-10, offers to the people of 

 Arid America the only good opportunity they have 

 ever had to lay the foundation for enduring institu- 

 tions. Neither at Salt Lake City nor at Los Angeles, 

 where the two previous sessions of the congress were 

 held, weie the circumstances favorable to the best 

 results. On neither occasion was the time ripe for 

 action. The people of the West were not ready to 

 formulate an expression of their best judgment, nor 

 were the people of the United States ready to listen. 

 Both of these essential conditions are now at hand. 

 After years of agitation which, during the past year, 

 has been directed through well-defined channels to 

 well-understood ends, the western people are ready 

 to suggest definite outlines for their future institu- 

 tions, and the day has come when manifest destiny 

 compels the country to listen, not only with sympa- 

 thetic, but with anxious ear. 



FROM SALT LAKE TO LOS ANGELES. 



Two years elapsed between the first Irrigation Con- 

 gress at Salt Lake City and the second Congress at Los 

 Angeles. It cannot be said that these two years were 

 employed to the best advantage. This was due in part to 

 the torpor of the National Committee, but more largely 

 to prevailing conditions. During that time the mining 

 industry absorbed the attention of the western mind 

 to such a degree as to render it almost impossible to 

 attempt a serious study of irrigation. The country as 

 a whole was in a state of fair prosperity, and was not 

 seeking new outlets for surplus population. The time 

 was not yet ripe for the great advance. The Los 

 Angeles Congress pursued what was then thought, 

 and what still seems, the wisest of all possible courses. 

 It recognized the wide differences between those who 

 favored a national and those who favored a state 

 policy of administration. It. realized that it would be 

 impossible to evolve from a five days' session results 

 fit to prove enduring. It formulated a statement of 

 principles which may be briefly summarized as 

 follows: 



1. Water in natural channels and beds is public property. The 

 right of use exists but not the right of ownership. 



2. Water companies are common carriers, subject to the super- 

 vision and control of the power from which they derive their 

 rights. 



3. Private works of irrigation may be condemned under the 

 exercise of the power of eminent domain, and taken for public 

 uses upon payment of just compensation. 



4. Inter-state streams must be conserved and equitably divided 

 among the States which they naturally supply under Federal 

 authority. 



5. Mountain watersheds should be rigidly guarded and pre- 

 served through the agency of the national government. 



6. The public lands are the heritage of the American people, 

 not the spoil of speculators. There can be no just law for the 

 disposal of these lands except one that recognizes the right 

 of every American child to have a home upon them without pay- 

 ing unfair tribute to the capital that reclaims them. 



This is by no means the whole of the Los Angeles 

 declaration, but it is the essence of it on the vital 

 questions that will underlie future irrigation policies. 

 The convention then authorized the creation of 

 seventeen commissions, one for each State and Terri- 

 tory in the arid and semi-arid regions, and charged 

 them with the duty of investigating local conditions 

 in connection with the study of the broader question 

 of national policy. These commissions were charged 

 to report at the next congress, which assembles in 

 the Broadway Theatre, Denver, September 3. 



The distance traversed by the irrigation movement 

 during the period intervening between Los Angeles 

 and Denver is prodigious. The question has suddenly 

 risen to one of national prominence. In several States 

 the commissions have performed splendid services, 

 and in all they have accomplished enough to justify 

 the hope that riper judgments will be brought to 

 Denver than to any previous convention. Industrial 

 calamities throughout the country have prepared the 

 way for the inauguration of a splendid movement of 

 national dimensions. 



THIS IS THE HOUR OF FATE. 



It requires many years to bring any great public 

 question to full maturity. A long period of thought 

 and discussion is essential in the shaping of laws and 

 customs, and it rarely happens that the problem is 

 ripe for solution before the nation is ready to solve it. 

 If the western people had perfected an irrigation 

 policy five years ago the country would not have been 

 ready to enact it into law. But the preliminary 

 stages have been passed. The time has come. The 

 opportunity must be taken at this fateful moment. 

 Mighty changes come swiftly when they come at all. 



I have studied the situation from ocean to ocean 

 during the past year and have taken observations 

 among all classes of people. I tell my fellow-citizens 

 of the West that this is the hour of fate for us. Let 

 the tide be taken at its flood. And let us remember 

 that we are to build, not for ourselves alone, but for 

 the long future. The policies which we enunciate at 

 Denver, if they be wise and just, will rule the desti- 

 nies of Arid America when we shall sleep within her 

 soil. 



EXISTING CONDITIONS ARE INTOLERABLE. 



The existing conditions throughout the arid region 

 are totally inadequate to the demands of our new civil- 



