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6 To explain the original understanding of the Constitution’s enumerated powers with regard to Indians, I start with our Nation’s Founding-era dealings with Indian tribes. Those early interactions underscore that the Constitution conferred specific, enumerated powers on the Federal Government which aimed at specific problems that the Nation faced under the Articles of Confederation. The new Federal Government’s actions with respect to Indian tribes are easily explained by those enumerated powers. Meanwhile, the States continued to enjoy substantial authority with regard to tribes. At each turn, history and constitutional text thus point to a set of enumerated powers that can be applied to Indian tribes—not some sort of amorphous, unlimited power than can be applied to displace all state laws when it comes to Indians.

Before the Revolution, most of the Thirteen Colonies adopted their own regulations governing Indian trade. See Adoptive Couple, 570 U. S., at 660 (, concurring); R. Natelson, The Original Understanding of the Indian Commerce Clause, 85 Denver U. L. Rev. 201, 219, and n. 121 (2007) (Natelson) (collecting laws). These regulations were necessary because colonial traders abused their Indian trading partners, often provoking violent Indian retaliation. See Adoptive Couple, 570 U. S., at 660–661; 1 F. Prucha, The Great Father 18–21 (1984) (Prucha). Most colonial governments thus imposed licensing systems of some form both to protect Indians and to maintain trading relationships with them. See id., at 19. However, the colonial laws were not uniform, leading to rivalries between the Colonies, corruption, fraud, and other abuses by traders. Id., at 21. Then, once the Nation had achieved independence, it “faced innumerable difficulties,” id., at 46, from finding ways to uphold its treaties with foreign nations to economic