Ready for Harness

The Upper Basin of the Colorado River is 110,000 square miles of Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona, all thirsting for water to develop their rich mineral resources and irrigate their potentially fine farmlands (TIME, Jan. 31, 1955). For 50 years basin planners have talked about a vast power and reclamation project to bring under control the Upper Colorado, last great unharnessed river system in the U.S. Yet four Congresses passed over the plan, mostly because of the opposition from conservationists (who feared, among other things, that a dam proposed for Echo Park, Colo, would flood the Dinosaur National Monument) and Southern California power interests (who profit under the present distribution of the Colorado's water).

Last year the Upper Colorado project was finally approved by the U.S. Senate --but its chances for House passage this year seemed doubtful. To mute the cries of the conservationists, the bill's managers agreed to drop the Echo Park dam from the House measure. Last week, while the House debated the bill, President Eisenhower made a strong plea for the bill, "an opportunity at last to treat the whole great, mighty Colorado River as a single entity, to treat it on a basin basis instead of merely local and individual. I hope we can have positive action on that as rapidly as possible."

Positive action came the next day: the House, by a surprising 256-to-136 vote, passed the Upper Colorado bill. It authorized spending $756 million on four major dams and on participating projects that would irrigate 132,000 acres of new land and supply additional water to 230,000 acres already under irrigation. Power from the dams will be purchased from the Federal Government by private utilities. After the House vote, the Upper Colorado bill was sent to a conference committee, where differences in the House and Senate versions were to be ironed out.

Other congressional work done:

P: The House Ways and Means Committee, in approving a money-raising section of the vast road construction program, voted to assess highway users nearly $14 billion in new taxes over the next 16 years. Among the committee recommendations: a 1-c- hike in the present 2-c--per-gallon gasoline and diesel fuel tax; a 3-c--per-lb. increase in the present 5-c--per-lb. tire tax; a 2% increase in the tax on the sales price of trucks, buses and trailers; a new annual tax of $1.50 per 1,000 lbs. on trucks weighing more than 26,000 lbs.

P:The Ways and Means Committee also voted to extend for one year, until April 1, 1957, the present tax on corporation earnings (30% on the first $25,000 and 52% thereafter) and the excise taxes on liquor, cigarettes, gasoline, etc.

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