United States v. Alcea Band of Tillamooks (329 U.S. 40)/Dissent Reed

Mr. Justice REED, with whom Mr. Justice RUTLEDGE and Mr. Justice BURTON join, dissenting.

This case presents directly for the first time in this Court the question of whether an Indian band is legally entitled to recover compensation from the United States for the taking by the Government of the aboriginal lands of the Indians when there has been no prior recognition by the United States through treaty or statute of any title or legal or equitable right of the Indians in the land. The Court allows compensation. The importance of the issue persuades us that we should express the reasons for our dissent. It is difficult to foresee the result of this ruling in the consideration of claims by Indian tribes against the United States. We do not know the amount of land so taken. West of the Mississippi it must be large. Even where releases of Indian title have been obtained in return for recognition of Indian rights to smaller areas, charges of unfair dealings may open up to consideration again legal or equitable claims for taking aboriginal lands.

The Court rightly states the effect of the jurisdictional act in these words:

'The Act removes the impediments of sovereign immunity and lapse of time and provides for judici l determination of the designated claims. No new right or cause of action is created. A merely moral claim is not made a legal one. (329 U.S. 45, 67 S.Ct. 169.) 'Lacking a jurisdictional act permitting judicial inquiry, such language cannot be questioned where Indians are seeking payment for appropriate lands; but here in the 1935 statute Congress has authorized decision by the courts upon claims arising out of original Indian title.' 329 U.S. 51, 67 S.Ct. 172.

This means, and the Court so treats the claims, that the Indians here get no money by grace or charity or for reasons of honorable dealings with helpless peoples. The recovery by them under this act will be because they have had valid claims against the United States on account of their ouster from these lands in 1855. These Indians have not been paid the sums owing them, one deduces from the Court's opinion, because the sovereign, our nation, kept the courts closed to them. The jurisdictional act, the Court holds, removes this bar to recovery. This conclusion conflicts with our understanding of this Government's right in the public lands of the nation.

The character of Indian occupancy of tribal lands is at least of two kinds: first, occupancy as aborigines until that occupancy is interrupted by governmental order; and, second, occupancy when by an act of Congress they are given a definite area as a place upon which to live. When Indians receive recognition of their right to occupy lands by act of Congress, they have a right of occupancy which cannot be taken from them without compensation. But by the other type of occupancy, it may be called Indian title, the Indians get no right to continue to occupy the lands; and any interference with their occupancy by the United States has not heretofore given rise to any right of compensation, legal or equitable.

This distinction between rights from recognized occupancy and from Indian title springs from the theory under which the European nations took possession of the lands of the American aborigines. This theory was that discovery by the Christian nations gave them sovereignty over and title to the lands discovered. Johnson v. McIntosh, 8 Wheat. 543, 572-586, 5 L.Ed. 681; 1 Story, Commentaries on the Constitution (5th Ed.) § 152. While Indians were permitted to occupy these lands under their Indian title, the conquering nations asserted the right to extinguish that Indian title without legal responsibility to compensate the Indian for his loss. It is not for the courts of the conqueror to question the propriety or validity of such an assertion of power. Indians who continued to occupy their aboriginal homes, without definite recognition of their right to do so are like paleface squatters on public lands without compensable rights if they are evicted. Tenure for Indian tribes specifically recognized by Congress developed along different lines in the original states, the Louisiana Purchase, the Mexican Session or the lands obtained by the Northwest Boundary Treaty. But there is no instance known to us where there has been intimation or holding that Congressional power to take Indian title to lands is limited. Whenever the lands to which the Indians had only Indian title were required for settlement or public use, the sovereign without legal obligation could extinguish that title by purchase or the sword.

In Barker v. Harvey, 181 U.S. 481, 21 S.Ct. 690, 45 L.Ed. 963 Mission Indians claimed a right of permanent occupancy in former Mexican lands ceded to the United States by the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. They made this claim against a right arising by virtue of a patent that was issued by the United States in confirmation of grants by the Mexican Government in derogation of the Indian title. This Court said as to this Indian title, 181 U.S. p. 491, 21 S.Ct. 694, 'that a claim of a right to permanent occupancy of land is one of far reaching effect, and it could not well be said that lands which were burdened with a right of permanent occupancy were a part of the public domain and subject to the full disposal of the United States.' This Court confirmed title contrary to the Indian claim. Rights of occupancy given to Indians by an executive order may be withdrawn without compensation to the Indians where their title was not recognized by Congressional act. The Indians do not hold such lands by the same tenure as they do the lands by the terms of a ratified treaty or statute. Sioux Tribe of Indians v. United States, 316 U.S. 317, 326-328, 62 S.Ct. 1095, 1099-1100, 86 L.Ed. 1501.

As we understand the present holding of the Court, it is that the manner of terminating his Indian title by the United States is limited by the duty to pay compensation. Therein, we think, lies the fundamental error of the Court's opinion. It is true that distinctions have been made between plenary authority over tribal lands and absolute power, with the suggestion that Congressional power over Indian title was not unlimited. See Cohen, Handbook of Indian Law, 94, 291, 309, 310, 311. Examination of the authorities cited, however, will show, we think, in every instance that where reference is made to the protection of Indian lands by the Fifth Amendment or to the legal obligation of the United States to compensate Indians for lands taken, the lands under discussion were lands held by the Indians under titles recognized by specific acts of Congress.

When Chief Justice Marshall expounded for the Court the power of the United States to extinguish Indian title, this doctrine was laid down for the nation's guidance in dealing with the Indians:

'The United States, then, have unequivocally acceded to that great and broad rule by which its civilized inhabitants now hold this country. They hold, and assert in themselves, the title by which it was acquired. They maintain, as all others have maintained, that discovery gave an exclusive right to extinguish the Indian title of occupancy, either by purchase or by conquest; and gave also a right to such a degree of sovereignty as the circumstances of the people would allow them to exercise.

' * *  * All our institutions recognize the absolute title of the crown, subject only to the Indian right of occupancy, and recognized the absolute title of the crown to extinguish that right. This is incompatible with an absolute and complete title in the Indians.

' * *  * Conquest gives a title which the courts of the conqueror cannot deny, whatever the private and speculative opinions of individuals may be, respecting the original justice of the claim which has been successfully asserted. * *  *

'The title by conquest is acquired and maintained by force. The conqueror prescribes its limits. * *  * Where this incorporation is practicable, humanity demands, and a wise policy requires, that the rights of the conquered to property should remain unimpaired; that the new subjects should be governed as equitably as the old, and that confidence in their security should gradually banish the painful sense of being separated from their ancient connections, and united by force to strangers.

' * *  * the tribes of Indians inhabiting this country were fierce savages, whose occupation was war, and whose subsistence was drawn chiefly from the forest. To leave them in possession of their country, was to leave the country a wilderness; to govern them as a distinct people was impossible, because they were as brave and as high spirited as they were fierce, and were ready to repel by arms every attempt on their independence.

'What was the inevitable consequence of this state of things? The Europeans were under the necessity either of abandoning the country, and relinquishing their pompous claims to it, or of enforcing those claims by the sword, and by the adoption of principles adapted to the condition of a people with whom it was impossible to mix, and who could not be governed as a distinct society, or of remaining in their neighborhood, and exposing themselves and their families to the perpetual hazard of being massacred.

'Frequent and bloody wars, in which the whites were not always the aggressors, unavoidably ensued. European policy, numbers, and skill, prevailed. As the white population advanced, that of the Indians necessarily receded. The country in the immediate neighborhood of agriculturists became unfit for them. The game fled into thicker and more unbroken forests, and the Indians followed. The soil, to which the crown originally claimed title, being no longer occupied by its ancient inhabitants, was parcelled out according to the will of the sovereign power, and taken possession of by persons who claimed immediately from the crown, or mediately, through its grantees or deputies.' 8 Wheat. 587-591, 5 L.Ed. 681.

It is unnecessary for this case to undertake at this late date to weigh the rights and wrongs of this treatment of aboriginal occupancy. Where injustices have been done to friendly peoples, Congress has sought to soften their effect by acts of mercy. Never has there been acknowledgment before of a legal or equitable right to compensation that springs from the appropriation by the United States of the Indian title.

'Extinguishment of Indian title based on aboriginal possession is of course a different matter. The power of Congress in that regard is supreme. The manner, method and time of such extinguishment raise political not justiciable issues. Buttz v. Northern Pacific Railroad, supra, 119 U.S. at page 66, 7 S.Ct. at page 104, 30 L.Ed. 330. As stated by Chief Justice Marshall in Johnson v. McIntosh, supra, 8 Wheat. at page 586, 5 L.Ed. 681, 'the exclusive right of the United States to extinguish' Indian title has never been doubted. and whether it be done by treaty, by the sword, by purchase, by the exercise of complete dominion adverse to the right of occupancy, or otherwise, its justness is not open to inquiry in the courts. Beecher v. Wetherby, 95 U.S. 517, 525, 24 L.Ed. 440.' United States v. Santa Fe Pacific R. Co., 314 U.S. 339, 347, 62 S.Ct. 248, 252, 86 L.Ed. 260.

The colonies, the states and the nation alike by their e rly legislation provided that only the respective sovereigns could extinguish the Indian title. The way in which it was to be extinguished has been held, continually, a political matter. The jurisdictional act now under consideration does not purport to change a political matter to a justiciable one.

When this present jurisdictional act was considered by Congress, nothing in the reports or the debates indicates that Congress intended to create a new liability because Indian title had been taken. This Court relies upon no change of attitude in Congress, but finds that this liability has always existed and that this act merely removes the bar against suit. This we think is contrary to the whole course of our relations with the Indians.

The Court finds a basis for this action in that this nation should not take the Indian title without compensation because such a taking would not satisfy the "high standards for fair dealing' required of the United States in controlling Indian affairs.' The language used by the Court is taken from United States v. Santa Fe Pacific R. Co., 314 U.S. 339 at page 356, 62 S.Ct. 248 at page 256, 86 L.Ed. 260. It there referred to an act unauthorized by Congress and not to such takings as here occurred when Congress opened the original home of these respondents for settlement.

In Worcester v. State of Georgia, 6 Pet. 515, 543, 544, 547, 556, 8 L.Ed. 483, lands had been specifically set apart for the Cherokees. Therefore Chief Justice Marshall's comments were directed at a situation that does not exist here.

A concurring opinion has been filed which holds that Congress in the act here involved 'created an obligation on the part of the Government to pay these Indians' for their Indian title. We do not think this present act is susceptible of that interpretation. We read the act, as we understand the opinion of the Court does, to permit recovery of compensation only in case there were rights in the Indians prior to its passage 'arising under or growing out of the original Indian title.' We think no rights arose from this Indian title. Therefore no compensation is due.

As we are of the opinion that the jurisdictional act permitted judgment only for claims arising under or growing out of the original Indian title and are further of the opinion that there were no legal or equitable claims that grew out of the taking of this Indian title, we would reverse the judgment of the Court of Claims and direct that the bill of the respondents should be dismissed. Cf. Northwestern Bands of Shoshone Indians v. United States, 324 U.S. 335, 65 S.Ct. 690, 89 L.Ed. 985.