Water Rights Protection Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. GARDNER. Madam Chair, I thank the chairman for his work on this very important issue, and my colleague from Colorado (Mr. Tipton) for his hard work to protect Colorado water rights.

You know, if you go to the capitol of Colorado, you go into the rotunda of that great and beautiful building, there on the wall on a mural are the words of a poem by Thomas Hornsby Ferril, and that poem says: ``Here is a land where life is written in water.''

The foundational laws of our great State deal with the waters of Colorado, the four corners of our State, whose agriculture, commerce, industry, and municipalities depend on that water and, yes, our ski industries, our farmers, our ranchers.

Thank goodness for legislation like this that will protect our water rights. Thank goodness for legislation like this that will make sure that the State's water law remains supreme.

How dare this body think that the Federal Government has a right to control our water or to condition permits based on the blackmail of a permit issuance from a ski resort, from a farmer, from a city.

These rights have gone through Colorado water law for decades, over a century. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent in Colorado to adjudicate these rights.

To think that the Federal Government can come in and take them because they won't issue a permit unless you give it to them, that is a taking of water. The Federal Government has no right to do that.

It is our State law in water that remains supreme. It is our State law that must remain supreme when it comes to the water of our land.

Here is a land where life is written in water. Those words will remain in our great State. Our laws will remain, and thank goodness for legislation like this to make sure that our State can control its water, not Washington, D.C.

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