Tribal sovereignty in the United States is the concept of the inherent authority of Indigenous tribes to govern themselves within the borders of the United States.
The Nonintercourse Act is the collective name given to six statutes passed by the United States Congress in 1790, 1793, 1796, 1799, 1802, and 1834 to set boundaries of American Indian reservations. The various acts were also intended to regulate commerce between White Americans and citizens of Indigenous nations. The most notable provisions of the act regulate the inalienability of aboriginal title in the United States, a continuing source of litigation for almost 200 years. The prohibition on purchases of Indian lands without the approval of the federal government has its origins in the Royal Proclamation of 1763 and the Confederation Congress Proclamation of 1783.
A series of efforts were made by the United States to assimilate Native Americans into mainstream European–American culture between the years of 1790 and 1920. George Washington and Henry Knox were first to propose, in the American context, the cultural assimilation of Native Americans. They formulated a policy to encourage the so-called "civilizing process". With increased waves of immigration from Europe, there was growing public support for education to encourage a standard set of cultural values and practices to be held in common by the majority of citizens. Education was viewed as the primary method in the acculturation process for minorities.
United States v. Kagama, 118 U.S. 375 (1886), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case that upheld the constitutionality of the Major Crimes Act of 1885. This Congressional act gave the federal courts jurisdiction in certain Indian-on-Indian crimes, even if they were committed on an Indian reservation. Kagama, a Yurok Native American (Indian) accused of murder, was selected as a test case by the Department of Justice to test the constitutionality of the Act.
Lone Wolf v. Hitchcock, 187 U.S. 553 (1903), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case brought against the US government by the Kiowa chief Lone Wolf, who charged that Native American tribes under the Medicine Lodge Treaty had been defrauded of land by Congressional actions in violation of the treaty.
Willis Van Devanter was an American lawyer who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1911 to 1937. He was a staunch conservative and was regarded as a part of the Four Horsemen, the conservative bloc which dominated the Supreme Court during the 1930s.
William Hayes Pope was the last Chief Justice of New Mexico Territory and the first United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of New Mexico after New Mexico attained statehood.
United States v. Nice, 241 U.S. 591 (1916), is a United States Supreme Court decision which declared that Congress still retains plenary power to protect Native American interests when Native Americans are granted citizenship. United States v. Nice overruled the Heff decision which declared that Native Americans granted citizenship by the Dawes Act were also then citizens of the state in which they resided, meaning the sale of alcohol to such Native Americans was not subject to Congress's authority.
The United States was the first jurisdiction to acknowledge the common law doctrine of aboriginal title. Native American tribes and nations establish aboriginal title by actual, continuous, and exclusive use and occupancy for a "long time." Individuals may also establish aboriginal title, if their ancestors held title as individuals. Unlike other jurisdictions, the content of aboriginal title is not limited to historical or traditional land uses. Aboriginal title may not be alienated, except to the federal government or with the approval of Congress. Aboriginal title is distinct from the lands Native Americans own in fee simple and occupy under federal trust.
Oneida Indian Nation of New York v. County of Oneida, 414 U.S. 661 (1974), is a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court concerning aboriginal title in the United States. The original suit in this matter was the first modern-day Native American land claim litigated in the federal court system rather than before the Indian Claims Commission. It was also the first to go to final judgement.
County of Oneida v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York State, 470 U.S. 226 (1985), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case concerning aboriginal title in the United States. The case, sometimes referred to as Oneida II, was "the first Indian land claim case won on the basis of the Nonintercourse Act."
Seneca Nation of Indians v. Christy, 162 U.S. 283 (1896), was the first litigation of aboriginal title in the United States by a tribal plaintiff in the Supreme Court of the United States since Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831). It was the first such litigation by an indigenous plaintiff since Fellows v. Blacksmith (1857) and its companion case of New York ex rel. Cutler v. Dibble (1858). The New York courts held that the 1788 Phelps and Gorham Purchase did not violate the Nonintercourse Act, one of the provisions of which prohibits purchases of Indian lands without the approval of the federal government, and that the Seneca Nation of New York was barred by the state statute of limitations from challenging the transfer of title. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the merits of lower court ruling because of the adequate and independent state grounds doctrine.
Joint Tribal Council of the Passamaquoddy Tribe v. Morton, 528 F.2d 370, was a landmark decision regarding aboriginal title in the United States. The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit held that the Nonintercourse Act applied to the Passamaquoddy and Penobscot, non-federally-recognized Indian tribes, and established a trust relationship between those tribes and the federal government that the State of Maine could not terminate.
The Marshall Court (1801–1835) issued some of the earliest and most influential opinions by the Supreme Court of the United States on the status of aboriginal title in the United States, several of them written by Chief Justice John Marshall himself. However, without exception, the remarks of the Court on aboriginal title during this period are dicta. Only one indigenous litigant ever appeared before the Marshall Court, and there, Marshall dismissed the case for lack of original jurisdiction.
The Narragansett land claim was one of the first litigations of aboriginal title in the United States in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Oneida Indian Nation of New York v. County of Oneida (1974), or Oneida I, decision. The Narragansett claimed a few thousand acres of land in and around Charlestown, Rhode Island, challenging a variety of early 19th century land transfers as violations of the Nonintercourse Act, suing both the state and private land owners.
New York ex rel. Cutler v. Dibble, 62 U.S. 366 (1858), was a companion case to the more well-known Fellows v. Blacksmith (1857). At the time Fellows was decided, this case had reached the U.S. Supreme Court but had not yet been argued.
South Carolina v. Catawba Indian Tribe, Inc., 476 U.S. 498 (1986), is an important U.S. Supreme Court precedent for aboriginal title in the United States decided in the wake of County of Oneida v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York State (1985). Distinguishing Oneida II, the Court held that federal policy did not preclude the application of a state statute of limitations to the land claim of a tribe that had been terminated, such as the Catawba tribe.
Aboriginal land title in New Mexico is unique among aboriginal title in the United States. Congressional legislation was passed to define such title after the United States acquired this territory following war with Mexico (1846–1848). But the Supreme Court of the New Mexico Territory and the United States Supreme Court held that the Nonintercourse Act did not restrict the alienability of Pueblo lands.
The Supreme Court of the United States, under Chief Justice Roger B. Taney (1836–1864), issued several important decisions on the status of aboriginal title in the United States, building on the opinions of aboriginal title in the Marshall Court.
United States v. Forty-Three Gallons of Whiskey, 108 U.S. 491 (1883), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that Congress has the power to regulate the possession and sale of liquor in the lands of and near Native American tribes and upheld an order to seize barrels containing forty-three gallons of whiskey that were being traded on Native American land.
