agencies. Congress, moreover, foresaw that on occasion this would require agencies to alter ongoing projects in order to fulfill the Act's goals. Though statements in Appropriations Committee Reports expressed the view of the Committees either that the Act did not apply to Tellico or that the dam should be completed regardless of the Act's provisions, nothing in the TVA appropriations measures passed by Congress said that the Tellico project was to be completed regardless of the Act's requirements. When voting on appropriations measures, legislators are entitled to assume that the funds will be devoted to purposes that are lawful and not for any purpose forbidden. A contrary policy would violate the rules of both Houses of Congress, which provide that appropriations measures may not change existing substantive law. An appropriations committee's expression does not operate to repeal or modify substantive legislation. Completion of the Tellico Dam project would violate the Act, so the Court of Appeals did not err by ordering the project to be enjoined. Congress has spoken in the plainest words, making it clear that endangered species are to be accorded the highest priorities. Since that legislative power has been exercised, it is up to the executive branch to administer the law and for the Judiciary to enforce it when, as here, enforcement has been sought. Burger's opinion emphasized that, as written, the Endangered Species Act explicitly forbade the completion of such projects as Tellico if the Secretary of Interior had determined that such a project would likely result in the elimination of a species. Although more than $100 million had been spent on the project by 1978, and the dam was substantially finished, the court could not allow the TVA to finish the project. According to Burger, this would force the court "to ignore the ordinary meaning of plain language." Supporters of the dam project, who believed that it would serve a much larger public good than protection of the snail darter, reacted in an effort to rework the Endangered Species Act. In his book The Fishes of Tennessee''' David Etnier later wrote: "the snail darter had become almost a household word, and in current usage 'snail darter types' is approximately synonymous with 'ultra-liberal environmental activists.'" Two Tennessee legislators get involved Congressman John Duncan, Sr., whose district included Tellico, and Senator Howard Baker. Duncan had been a long-time congressional supporter of the project. On the other hand,