submission in this case is that in defining indian tribe for its to purposes congress did not deliberately include alaska native regional and village corporation only to then actually we would all of them by subjecting them to a formal political recognition requirement that know and see meet or indeed has ever met instead of a settled understanding for the last forty five years has been met and sees are eligible to be treated as indian tribes for is to purposes even though and these are not and have never been federally recognized indian tribes that interpretation has been endorsed by all three branches of the federal government congress was acting against the backdrop of those settled understanding twenty corporator the as the definition of indian tribe into the careys act in tw congress chose to make and he's eligible to receive no use of dollars of coronavirus relief funds to benefit the many alaska natives who may serve the decision below contravenes policy judgment and threatens to shut and out of a wide range of important federal programs no sound principle of textual interpretation justifies such a dramatic departure from the status quo reading the the definition to mean a and t s are included only in the event that they are sunday somehow recognized by the united states for government to government relations would render their deliberate inclusion in the statute a dead letter either the recognition clause must mean something else or it does not apply to n c s now we principally urge the latter approach which the department of the interior and the indian health service adopted decades ago and which the th circuit endorsed in the cook inlet case in our view congress define the entity eligible to enter and it is to agreement federally recognized indian tribes and also in addition  the entities that play a similar role in the special case of alaska namely alaska native villages and alaska native corporations defined in an established pursuing tanks that are eating unlike responded through gives it back to every word and clause in history and there was a time when this court also relying on those sources but this this is not that time and what is the best case you can cite from recent years for your your general approach well i think the cases that we find the most instructive is the court decision again in united states and hated which is the case discussed in our opening brief in a the court with considering an attached very definition of the term  misdemeanor domestic misdemeanor or sorry misdemeanor crime of domestic violence and the battery definition there had a prefatory clause and two subsection then the question for the court with how to would you give it would you repeat maybe i missed your your textual argument again it seems like the it seems i don't know how you can read to include a and c and a and congress and not deliberately and specifically refer to alaska native village and regional corporation as nablus pursuant to a then recent federal law only to act with them in the very next clause we don't think the statute should be read to be at war with itself and what do you do with that recognized the language well we think that that clause the interior department concluded in one thousand nine hundred and seventy six shortly after it was enacted we think that created of course has been altered as an alternative we have also advance in this court the argument that if you understand the recognition was to apply to the entity those to me are then recognition cannot refer exclusively to formal federal recognition for government to govern congress included a provider there saying that perk for the avoidance of doubt that definition includes a and b now in the most recent law the america rescue plan act i promised provided additional fund coronavirus relief fund to state and local government and to tribal government using the list active definition which would then be used to the congress determined not to include m p s in that program and of course congress could have done that in the cares act of could have reached for the lift act of a nation which everyone understands does not includ corporations make that kind of expenditure are there examples of where they did or would normally or where it was necessary in other words necessaries in the care i think yes you're i and they have and can incur necessary expenditures in response that endemic i think like the purchase of personal protective equipment modifying facilities for say social st and saying ok i see that so what's actually council about that but if you can't prevail on that basis i can see one textual argument could possibly work for you and you make it only in passing and that is that  e which is recognised as eligible doesn't mean formal recognition in the sense in which indian tribes are recognized do you have any other a cause modifying a list and you wanted to jump over the last item in the list that's really odd is that i take the point let me try a plain english example to illustrate how we think is the definition works here i mean to pose a state where to prioritize for vaccinations all doctors nurses and other health care workers including their spouses and minor children whose jobs require frequent contact with the public i think in context one would naturally understand that the final clause in that because referring to jobs requiring free frequent contact with the public really only modifies and in context can only be understood to modify the doctors nurses and other health care workers who appear in the list at the beginning and then there's just an including cla stuck in the middle there and perhaps not the most elegant place but in a place that makes clear that the intent is to expand that category of you know front line workers to also include their families and minor children and that's what congress did in the of the definition  congress to congress include the definition is best read to refer to federally recognized indian tribes and then also including in addition to specific alaskan native village and read a regional corporation to congress  for inclusion in alaska specific laws all right well that's very close to what i refer to as the absurdity argument if we were to take the other possible textual approach and say recognize doesn't mean many other sashes anwesha say definition is used as well and just avoid i think our alternative argument is a little a slightly different i mean i think we would say that recognition on the alternative argument recognition doesn't work for exclusively to federal recognition for government to government relations but can also refer to the lesser status that congress conferred on a and b and there's a reason i would emphasize that distinction and it you know it would i mean it or contracting is not counsel i'm a bit concerned the way justice prior is about what our ruling would mean here and it's consistent in part with what justice alito has just sassed you which is how do we in a narrow way that affects only the cares act and now the many other acts that are involved for is earth the schneider act which i think is now the indian health improvement that and the transfer act but i'm also understanding i believe  if we were to lick sept respondants position and the d c circuits holding below that is to does not cannot include anyone but steadily recognize tribes would we be putting at risk all of those other services well yes and if so is the federal government prepared to step in and provide those services but i think that that's exactly right your housing assistance and energy assistance and you know to to to your broader point justice sotomayor and that is the interpretation that we are proposing here be interpretation that has prevailed for forty five years and that was the backdrop for congress as an act probably in that category here but as you said i mean i think fairly clear what the meaning of this diet it was done and i want to end it in the question becomes is it you know because i think it's a high bar before we're so confident that congress made a mistake that we just say we think congress made a mistake but they meant something else and that comes to this question of could they have meant what they appear to mean if you just look at the test which is that they included the understood and he had me clued in only on the condition that congress itself in the future were to somehow decide to recognize from government to government relations is recently i wish an privately owned corporation we just don't think that th ery some uncertainty at the time about what kinds of alaskan groups would be recognized i mean we often say that alaska is different and that seems to be the case here that the government  recognize native groups without traditional his star of its a n c is would have resembled tribes in that they owned land i mean we just have sort of different groups here and why my congress not have thought well we'll see how it all plays out and maybe one day given the circumstances of alaska these groups will be recognized but doesn't take into the principle of consideration going the other way is that one hundred and eighty years one of the core congress at the time in an act that is that it was not true and these were established pursuant to a special federal law they are incorporated under state law and they are not harboring entities and that was evident to everyone at the time thank you justice  know the d c circuit suggested that that's a subtle term of art that refers to government to government relations what's your response to that argument well you know in the lower courts we also advocated the recognition clause should be understood to refer to recognition a formal term of art and that's an important premise for our main argument which is that the clause as a matter of context really cannot be read to include the  as a term of art it's less clear to us that that would have been apparent to congress and nine hundred and seventy five dollars when in fact it is mean the precise language at issue here recognized as eligible that phrase was not common  that you agree with the other petition or that we shouldn't read it as a term of art so i'm a little confused about what your argument is well i just haven't i it's an argument the alternative i mean our principal argument is that the recognition cause refers to recognition as a term of as a term of art or formal the establishment and institutionalization of formal government to government relations and and that's why  cannot be read to apply to the a n c because there's simply no sound basis to think that congress had in mind and fees would be included only in the event that they were somehow in the future recognised for government to govern relations now in the alternative if  the court disagrees with us on that point and we would we would argue that a reasonable and certainly a reading that is available to the court is that the recognition applies to the aunties by that that it doesn't refer exclusively to recognition in that term of art both of those construction would be far better than the d c circuit constructions which render the alaska specific be rendered being deliberate inclusion of a n t s just a dead letter statute to pick up on the questions i think just as prior justice alito and justice sotomayor were asking about the implications for other statutes with number of amicus briefs saying for example the pretty for the senators and congressman saying the potential ramifications would be staggering if your position would not prevail the coke and when one side says it would destabilize the entire tribal health and social services system in alaska the brief of the anchorage area has to deliver federally funded health care services to alaska native and in anchorage and you know with respect to that it agreement congress enacted a statute that provide arguably provide a statutory basis for that separate and apart from it so we're not we're not entirely sure what the effect of it efficient would be on here either arrangement but certainly we are gravely concerned about you know that he gave life in effect of disrupting what has been that it's well over a very long about five hundred and thirty million dollars but as a result of separate litigation there are proceedings on going in district court in d c right now through the result of this proceeding the treasury is currently in the process  the federal government for services that are designed to go to indians because of their status as indians and you said well sure you can look at this i understand it to back up argument but you can understand and it's ordinary meaning as the other petitioner advocates for then you say but a lesser included definition would be the term of art recognition definition like we see in the later past list act i don't really see how you can have a lesser included specialized definition it seems to me either it's ordinary meaning or it's not and you're kind of cagey in your brief and i think a little bit at oral argument too about whether in fact that eligibility clause refers to farty status so which is it i mean is this the st time that the government has taken the position that language like this doesn't refer to effort to study its i guess i would i would but the point this wave i mean we think that quality can be reasonably read to refer to having a requisite status under federal law and it just applied and you know different entities would be able to satisfy that requirement in different ways for the a and the congress to be found to satisfy it by specific leave including among the entities that are eligible to enter into estate agreements for the generic terms looked at the beginning of the statute that is any indian tribe band the specific mention of the alaskan entities would have not made any sense if the eligibility clause was designed to apply to them because and sees by their very composition we have you know they were designed to channel money from the federal government to their shareholders and so they had that status from the beginning so what i'm asking you is a little bit different because if the ordinary meaning of that eligibility cla we would entirely i bet i decision on those grounds that and i don't mean to be dancing around it our concern is that in general we would hope to preserve the ability to ensure that their agreement are entered into with tribes or federally recognized tribes that have a kind of recognized status under federal law and not simply groups self identified indians who come to the interior department and demand to take over the delivery of federally funded services that's why it's important to us as a program mattick matter that in general the way that indian tribes demonstrate that they have the requisite status is through the acknowledgment process during the  i would just like to emphasize again a couple of the points that i touched on this morning st is the definition of indian tribe should not be read to be at war with itself congress did not deliberately and specifically include and seize in one called only even though they are not federally recognized indian tribe that was the administrative construction of the th circuit's construction in the cook inlet case the construction articulated in all of the leading treatises in this area that's the meaning congress incorporated and that's the meaning we asked this court to endors unlike lower forty eight tribes and seas have never been sovereign but they have hours played a critical role in distributing special federal indian benefits to alaska natives congress specifically added a n c tuesday is definition of indian tribes response however contend that congress accomplish nothing because a n c is do not satisfy the eligibility clutch but if that clause is only given its ordinary meaning and sees plainly satisfy congress it recognizes eligible not recognized the sovereign caretaker being told to feed the cat and goldfish d which are barking and but the force of that analogy comes from the fact that it's impossible for the goldfish d to borrow in this case act recognize the a and c s but that would be a complete departure both from the nature of and seeds and the nature of sovereign recognition but you didn't or do agree that they have to have a story congress has the authority to recognize them  on any understanding of the nature of either and seas or sovereign recognition to say that the and seas would be recognized in stride and finally we find out where judge henderson did and say that the purpose is clear the text is also clear how do i come out the other way how do you resolve that conflict i think the way to resolve that conflict the easiest way is to  give the eligibility clause its ordinary meaning it says recognize this eligible it doesn't say recognize the sovereign now those may be the same thing in the lower forty eight but they're very different in alaska because of the settlement and so i think that's the way you there i mean there so there's an overlap between the village level and she's in the village it's where there is not an overlap it's between the membership in the shareholders the regional and cs and the villages and if you look at just the anchorage area alone you're talking about fifty four thousand alaskan natives who get benefits from siri who are not a member of one of the anchorage area villages which are actually in anchorage they're just in the surrounding region so are most of the are the shareholders of the corporations e n c that are they also members of tribes too or are there non tribal members who are non tribal individuals who are shareholders there are many many you know tens of thousands alaskan natives who are shareholders men and she but not enrolled members of any village type truck so there is a substantial number that of course there is some overlap but once you find that both entities are eligible there are various ways that it's relatively easy to avoid double counting and i would i would you do that you would just make adjustments for overlapping membership you can also for some formulas you use things different other than population so there's a variety of ways that the treasury department actually did it in this very distribution of punch and more generally the federal government has found a way to make this work because you really do as you do have identifiable native populations not just in anchorage but in share bankston to herd in val d's to serve by any village but are served by the regional is that you know essentially congress didn't want to prefigure how the sport would decide this case so when congress wanted to include the federally recognized tribes only it used the list at definition and what it wanted to include  just fire with your other argument the you said well they're eligible they're eligible mine that would get us out of this problem but i'm worried about the other one hundred and dollars statutes have you looked at those you go does your doesn't that kind of definition wouldn't cause a problem somewhere else i have looked at those definitions just prior and i don't think it would create a problem in those other statutes and i guess what i would say is i think the situation is a symmetrical if there are there are a couple of statutes and respondents point to them that seem to include the a and seizing a statute that is otherwise addressed to some sovereign function that the a and she's really don't discharge that modest degree of over inclusion is really harmless error because they just don't participate in the program converse really there are plenty of statutes that embody the is a definition and are plainly involved e definition from is b s so i think the impact on other stanch is completely asymmetric if the agencies fall out because they don't provide that particular program no harm no foul if instead they are cut out of programs they've participated in for decades there are going to be tens of thousands of alaskan natives who don't get benefits that congress plainly intended but they would recede not just in the abstract but through a n c thank you justice  alito i think as you can see from this morning's argument though the probably the principal difference is i want to leap to the ordinary language argument and my friend from the government seems to only want to get sort of edge there but you know i don't think the other side can really have it both ways you're either a text to a syrian not and if you're textual if why when she will apply the plain meaning of recognised as eligible congress it recognizes eligible not recognized the sovereign those may be interchangeable in the lower forty eight but they're very different terms in alaska and that all goes back to the settlement a congress didn't want to replicate the lower forty eight sovereign tribes mord to reservations when they distributed the benefits of the land settlement so they created these new entities that were distinctly native entities they caused every alaska native to enroll in one of the regional and seeds they didn't require them to enroll in a village and then four years later congress said in a process of furthering shelf determination we want to include the and seeds it would be bizarre to cut them out on the understanding that what congress really wanted it's not to have and she's play a role in self determination but only allow sovereign entities to play a role in self determination when congress just rejected that judgment in alaska let me ask you to see if i'm correct on these two points what do you see recognized as eligible to me so i see recognizes eligible to mean recognized by the federal government is eligible to participate in special federal indian programs and what he said in the lower forty eight recognition and sovereignty go together but in alaska in particular they sort of split that adam and they created these entities be a and seeds that are eligible to participate in special federal indian programs but they were never understood to be farmers and so i think if you is different from this regard then i think that really solves the problem here and as you hear ira i don't disagree with you i think that it would make no sense and think saying that you were recognized to receive money that was being given to governments when a and c are not governments oh i think that's relatively straightforward your honor because yes the money is being given to tribal governments but tribal government is just the recognized government in body of a tribe as defined in india and since a and sees are is d a tribes and they clearly have statutes that have a statutory term of tribal government and expressly include and sees in the definition of tribal government somewhat ironically being clued and sees but not the villages in a definition that is specifically because if you understand that the settlement act is distributing the benefits from an aboriginal land settlement the traditional thing you would do in that circumstance in the lower forty eight dollars is you would give the proceeds to a tr two things your honor st of all they were aboriginal land claims so right there you know these are distinct native entities to receive distinctly native benefits but then the nd point i would make and i think this is important understand is alas natives were eligible in general for special federal indian benefits even before the settlement act through the snyder at and the snyder act is one of the acts that is empowered for self determination under so in a sense this all works perfectly together having just created distinct native entities that every alaskan native was a member of one of the regional and seeds then congress in one thousand and seventy five dollars includes those entities in the statute it's all about self determination with respect to funds that alaska natives had already all along even before nine hundred and seventy one then clement seems to me that the government is a little nervous about moving off of recognition and its formal sense because it's concerned about self identifying groups to clear in their eligibility for a lot of federal programs and you're a little less concerned about that understandably but there are a couple of a couple of terms there that just struggle with it to the extent we're defining it tribal government cares act odd fit for a corporate board again just discourses i don't think that it is and you know various indian tribes and you probably know this better than i do or organized in various different ways i'm sure there are lower forty eight tribes that have some kind of corporate incorporation and some kind of board so it's not like you can have a native entity that is governed by a board of directors which is a very common ordinary way of referring to it to stood what one of what about the separate phrase indians because of their statuses and again that seems like an odd fit for the and c's given that of course you can be a member of the corporation without being a native today a lot of alienation has occurred and is permissible to think your honor there has been that much alienation and anybody who is not a native doesn't get a voting share they just get a share but with that minor clarification i obviously that sort of special federal indian benefits for indians is is a bit of an odd phrase not just i think it's a n t s but to any group because it really seems to be talking about the benefits that the alaskan natives or the lower forty eight natives themselves are eligible because of their status as an indian but to the extent entities have a status nobody doubts that and keys have a native status and i think the fact that the real point of the self determination act is to take natives who are eligible for special federal indian benefits and instead of having the federal government provide those directly you have a tribal entity doing that and in alaska the a n c is have been doing that for forty five years understanding i think from what you're saying that the canon is something one exception the ordinary meaning in other words sometimes you'll look at a phrase or word since the ordinary meaning in sex but the term of our that we know is is why so your understanding of how worth net is my understanding just as kavanagh and i do think as your question suggested that the strong preference is for ordinary meaning which is the rule and the term of art is the exception and in a situation like this we're adopting the term of art reading would create a real problem with the statute that seems like an obvious case to the sort of the ordinary meaning and what sure best everything to turn on sovereignty it would have said recognize the sovereign or it might have even said eligible via recognition but it didn't use any of those terms and one of the point i'd like to emphasize is that the term of art argument is much weaker the federal government's recognition process was kind of a mess and when they tried to regularize it a little bit nine hundred and seventy eight with their st regulations even those regulations talked about acknowledgement and even today the federal government has an office  tribal acknowledgement not an office of tribal recognition it's really not until one thousand nine hundred and four in the list act that you can really see recognized as eligible as being a term of art and even then it's really only a term of art to the lower forty eight dollars so making it a the list that uses language that identical to the eligibility class and says why then aren't ank really practically automatically recognized under the lestat well they're not your honor because if you go into the details of the list back and you go and look at the notes to the definition it's very clear that what congress was trying to do in the list act was to essentially force the interior department to formalize its process for sovereign recognition and the a n c is just based on any traditional criteria for sovereign recognition just don't come within the terms of that list act process i identical because it in whatever congress has talked about recognition as meaning only sovereignty in subsequent years after nine hundred and ninety dollars rather one hundred and seventy five dollars they specifically tethered to recognition by the secretary and i think that brings in the entirety of the process for recognition and it's sovereign requirements and if you go back to one thousand nine hundred and seventy five the idea that when congress was trying to promote self determination in alaska it was going to hinge that on whether the alaska entities were sovereign doesn't make any sense even as to the villages it took eighteen years to figure out whether the villages were sob i mean i don't see that but it's kind of at war with the plain meaning of the text if it's understood to be a term of art and i mean i take your point that maybe it wasn't a term of art when if there was an active but became a later particularly after the list that can you think of any other instance in statutory interpretation where something has had its ordinary meaning in the beginning and then gained a term of art where then you interpret statutes differently depending on where they fell on the continuum of that process it seems to me i can't point to that but i would say two things one is if a term recognized as it usually is is a term of art and the best evidence of that is not hot stuff which was passed one year later in one thousand nine hundred and five and it basically mimics is the is deal language and it's been interpreted from day one to include the fees and they got forty million dollars of funding under it last year thank you meant to comment to wrap up counsel thank you mr chief justice in the end with the eligibility clause has an ordinary meaning that a and c satisfy for a term of art meaning  only native affiliation is with an a n c cutting and she's out as is the is definition would leave those alaskan native out in the cold coming out and she's would also destroy alaska self determination success story that depends on cooperation between  questions counsel i think your side's fundamental argument is that the text is clear and that that doesn't include by the time you get to the end of the sentence it doesn't include the a and my question is why doesn't that text undermine the plain language argument in other words we're not talking about some overriding purpose not talking about   we discussed that in the very next section of the terrorist act congress does exactly that it refers to cities towns parishes there that are over five hundred thousand people and congress point this was a revolution in the relationship between the national government and native american governments and these were not governmental organizations there was no one certainty at the time the whole point was that they were not governmental entities there was certainly a lot of back and forth on that issue during that period of time so there were then those attempts furthered it was would be a separate issue for a later date why would congress put an sees in the language and then take them out i mean if it is your argument based solely on the uncertainty and some point in the future congress might on do was substantial uncertainty in one thousand nine hundred and seventy five that certainly what the court of appeals found that there was sufficient uncertainty when we're dealing with an act of congress we don't expect them to be omniscient here we don't expect them to make that resolution we expect them to make sure that they cast a wide enough net and then they use the exclusion cause the qualification clause at the end to then eliminate those who wouldn't qualify and that has the concept that define and in time the congress could have incorporated certainly you know obviously from the types perspective we would have rather they specifically incorporated the last act but our view is that the after one thousand nine hundred and three it's clear qualification that same within the is via we know the united states until now has been saying that same exact thing now all through this case now they've got an alternative argument that is no better but they've been saying that themselves that they don't and we don't have that here in fact what we have is a lot of things that are in my view most of the things are on the other side they can point to one thousand nine hundred and seventy six memo and and then there's not a number of other things that point the exact opposite way so we don't see how they meet any of the three elements for that cation in your brief you seem to and i could be wrong but you seem to make a distinction between indian tribes and people of  native american ancestry what difference would that make if any when we try the ones of the united states o c trust duty to them it established their membership and that happens in alaska as well and so those are the people that have the that trust relationship to their tribe with the united states so when we're talking about trust responsibilities that's what we're talking about so you know the amcs have numerous people who for whatever reason are not members of tribes we agree with mr comment there but that that happens everywhere there's of people who say there are native american in the lower forty eight who are not members of types that's not an uncommon thing that this court has always said tried to find their membership and then the federal recognition establishes the t responsibilities and so that's where you have the trust responsibility flowing to and hold members of tribes thank you justice for the morning thank you imagine you work for a company that sends people subscription requests you know they keep information about subscriptions to that numbers of publications and i write back you get this letter and you're in charge of filling requests dear  i would like more information about any newspaper including the atlantic monthly which is published daily we would you be at a loss as to how to fill that request i'm sorry just list including the atlantic monthly which is published daily i'm just asking you if you have a problem giving you what i want is that you wouldn't know what i want take it home and you show it to your cousin who is the world's greatest marian and you say see the kind of bad grammar i get and he says you're right to call that poor grammar but not in correct grammar it's not good but it's far from perfect and i ask that only because i've never heard of the canon that says you have to use perfect grammar or even that you have to use good grammar when you are a member of congress but you know he's right well i would agree that it's not that we and i'm sure the court knows this better than me we don't expect congress to use perfect grammar if we did that in this case now we would have had a problem if they'd use perfect grammar but what we do for the legal analysis is we start from a plain text from what they wrote down and what they wrote down is said you know we know literally what it said thank you thank you justice alito mr rasmussen suppose that the definition of any and tribe necessary palla what you account for the reference to and sees in the definition of an indian tribe would you make the same argument or with your argument have to be different well you make the same argument that still you have the clear language you know if you're dealing with it something that it's going to be a one time statute as we are here with the cares act eat i think that that does change it the analysis some but i would still be making the same argument well how could you make the same argument because then the clause that refers to the to a ses will be surplusage it would be it would be absurd knew all of that information might well have been to congress didn't know it was making a one time distribution of funds congress didn't know or we should not presume that congress was aware of it no a n c had been recognized in the size that you think is again i think that you're asking me what are you it would be an argument would still be the same we would have much to mark a much much more difficult argument on absurdity in that context and we have now he would not just have a understand where a court would come out with that decision yes well how do you disagree you say that and no way in order to be eligible for these funds as an entity has to be recognized in a certain sense no way and see had been recognized in that sense at the time when congress made this one time distribution of funds and yet congress for the a n c he's in the definition of groups that are eligible for these funds there's a blatant contradiction yes i would agree in that context mary is and that's why i do think that you know again i could imagine a court saying that is absurd i wouldn't say that is absurd because i think you know again the  plain language and the complexity of this is sufficient that if congress wants to you know over include and then use a qualifier at the end to eliminate things that's how we often trap statutes  we don't go and do that research to find out what exactly whether there would be any possibility of an a n c qualifying the congress wouldn't do that for congress says any person over the age of twenty one is eligible for something however nobody of the twenty ages thirty and thirty two is eligible for this yes contradictory provisions right when we come back to my my example is there any reason why we should not analyze the cares act as if the definition of an indian tribe had been created for that purpose  and instead of incorporating by reference a definition that was adopted at a different time you see a difference between those two things i see the cares act itself and then incorporates that requirement of recognition within itself that's where the view is that instead of trying to make it by decision and going on to all these other priests that discuss all these extraneous issues  should be looking at the cares act itself which includes that concept of recognition and we all know what that concept of recognized indian tribe means for us state he tried to escape absurdity by saying that when he i s math right when is was passed there was no term of art that you were recognized as a government body so now what you're arguing i think is that's clear today when the keris act was passed that as justice alito just pointed out then why would congress ha bother to include a n c s in the care act at all since after forty five years it clearly knows now that no way in c has ever been politically recognized now i think the governance of certainty to absurdity argument has more force because in forty five years not a one if we accept what the d c circuit said and seventy four it was uncertain whether some would be recognized politically it's clear now it's not going to be so don't we have to accept mr clements argument that is does language as used in that care sat cannot mean political recognition no because the chairs act itself for traits that same concept of recognized governing body of an indian tribe and so that's where congress did include that concept within the tears act itself the concept is also within which is it may not be the case with some of it is to us uses in other acts like the housing act and in other provisions of care coronavirus care where and the grammar often allows us to choose between two possible meanings of a statute but you have to have another possible meaning for grammar to serve that function and the question is whether there really is another conceivable meaning here so you said there is because congress in the future could have recognized and seize this leader said he would have never done that in the past but there is this something even more than that which seems to make this an implausible understanding which is that you know and putting aside whether it's theoretically plausible  just different from the tribes that were recognized at the time they are nonprofit corporations suzerain for profit corporations known star bonds members who aren't  shareholders who aren't members of the tribe and why should we even think that congress had that in mind as a possibility at the time to make the is federally recognized tribes it i guess what i'm contesting is the idea that anybody at the time would have thought that congress would do it well there was there's certainly been efforts to try out some of the a and cs federally recognized at least a few of them have been federally recognized that there has been that effort so you know to date those haven't succeeded but there are there is by no means certainty i mean suppose i thought that there were you know a two percent chance that congress would ever do that what should i do and interpret i comes around there and they meet that definition that they are qualified to come in and basically on an equal footing to all the other tribes that that's what why that is in there well again if we could just go back and seventy five and ask what was there really any realistic prospects that congress would have included a n c is as as federally recognized tribes and if i say you know it's theoretically possible congress has the authority to do this if you want to round a new poll of congress and you said do you think a man sees a federally recognized tribes that would say well of course not and and say i thought that there was an extremely low probability that anybody thought that that was you know a possibility they just say one of us we can you know and it's a it's a theoretical possibility that we can put it from our minds and and we can say they would intend included this clause about and sees if they didn't mean to include this clause about a do that work for it and set of making those decisions i mean if congress had not included and sees in that particular act then it would be saying yes and she's can never qualify but it didn't do that instead against that as the that ruling for the n c's that allowed a sort of double dipping that they be counted twice for purposes of the cares act mr clemente responded that concern this morning by suggesting that the federal government has lots of ways to  nistrative leave ensure that that doesn't occur if that's right it's hard to see what we're fighting about here can you explain your views well what we know is that the united states has reserved  get if i were called correctly from our brief in a footnote in our brief and also in a footnote in utah five hundred and thirty million dollars out of about seventy one million dollars if i recall correctly was allocated to the population of amcs and to the extent agencies have tribal members in them that is enrolled indians in them those men enrolled indians have already been counted as not being in the record to explain how the united states came up with this large figure for the to deal with that problem and that therefore they are really fighting over nothing here why isn't that correct well right now i would say it's not correct because when we're dealing with a terrorist act there is that the allocation has already been formulated but more broadly to the extent that again no matter where we are to the extent that there are not enrolled people of indian descent they are not indians for federal indian law purposes and the indians are the ones that are involved in the tides in alaska people who are of indian descent and have to meet the enrollment criteria of any type in alaska and becom that government to government relationship allow me to move to a different set of questions of how might the keris act speaks of tribal governments and i asked mr coleman is that an awkward fit with c s for profit corporations and he suggested no that it's entirely possible that the native tribes in the lower forty eight could organize themselves in a similar fashion what are your thoughts about that in is a very awkward construction given that title five is all about government including tribal governments including the recognized governing bodies of indian tribes so we've got this concept of government within that section repeatedly  the money what we're dealing with here is really and this goes back a little to your last question what we're dealing with here is whether that money goes directly to the indian types who then make the decision whether to provide it to for example and seize who are  doing services that benefit their members or whether it goes to the agencies directly cutting out the tribes and eliminating their ability to make that decision and so in the lower forty eight dollars that's exactly what's going on the money went to the tribes the tribes make the decisions they can it out to tribal organisations similar to a m c c if they want to and if those agencies were providing valuable services there are a few of them that are but what we've got here is a decision that every a n c qualifies and every a n c is going to get  least one hundred thousand dollars and some of them are going to get tens of millions and just to return a question that justice thomas posed i'm not sure i got the answer to if effectively this recognition no i don't think it is at all because i think we now have clarity of what that definition means and so when we look at the other statutes where that is used as we discussed and as the national congress of american indian stresses it in depth in their briefs when you an opportunity to respond to how i think the two statutory arguments on the other side emerged potentially so it seems to me if we start with text and we look at recognizes eligible we have a choice to read that and it's ordinary meaning strickland says or we read it as a term of art and that's the choice we have and we have to figure out how do we resolve that and one of the ways we usually resolve that is looking at the context to see how congress might and then using the phrase here and once we broaden out a lens and look at the context we see the expressing clues in of the and sees and we  see that they would be left out completely meaning many tens of thousands of native alaskans would be left out completely not only from the cares act but from many other social services statutes so given that contact if that's correct why doesn't that absurdity or oddity or whatever you want to call it hell influenced the choice we have to make between whether to follow ordinary meaning or term of art meeting for the phrase recognized as eligible well i i think you in the question you have bought into a couple of the incorrect statements made by the a and c's in this case no indian no person who is a member of federally recognized tribes was not already counted when to start with that territory divided the money amongst the indian tribes so when they're referring to indians they're referring to people who are not enrolled in any indian tribe they don't have that political relationship with the states but there are numerous people who are not members of tribes who are indian and that they can be full blooded indian even and still not be enrolled in a tribe but that's not an uncommon thing and that can happen in alaska too and if they want those people wanted to enroll in an indian tribe and they met the qualifications for a moment any in an indian tribe they can do that and then congress forcing this money to be governments and the governments so the indian government system focus again on the question we have a choice of how to raise the phrase recognize this eligible and we figure out do we go ordinary meaning or rigo term of art on that it seems that the express inclusion of the a and seasoned given some of the points that have been states dock there be list back and use that same exact phrase to you and say these are of it tribes who are referring these are b and she's where referring to we're going to list them so that everybody knows that was what that was designed to do it surprised that clarity for  what it's using is a term that later becomes the term that is used frequently and that congress then has the united states define to the list act and bind the members that meet that qualification and lend definition let staggering in terms of the effects that in our farming sort have on this program but also many other programs now they know alaska they know how these statutes fit together the members of congress from alaska are our appropriately attentive to this why are they wrong in describing the consequences of choosing the term of art over ordinary meaning well  i think you know i would not question that they know alaska but i think they also are motivated by getting five hundred and thirty three million dollars up into alaska instead of into the lower forty eight dollars mostly in school or forty eight states divided amongst all the tribes there so that's part of what they're doing but when we look at the record in this case and the examples that they use those are not accurate for example siri as united states do we make i'm going to read you this language from and i'm wondering how to fit that in with your theory it says a later alaska natives shall remain eligible for all federal indian programs on the same basis as other native americans notwithstanding any other provision of law that would take that to mean that because of alaska's unusual indeed very distinct method of handling benefits to native americans that that amendment makes clear that the trust why but if you know what it is doing is say on the same basis as others and that same basis as we all know now is richard position native alaskans have no right to any benefits even though they are even though they're automatically put an angsty if they don't enroll in alaskan villages you know the equivalent of tribes it's your position that despite th village you know that that is not our position that many of the programs that we're talking about so for instance now i was there housing program and many of these other ministers when i think you're not understanding my question used asserted broadly that the trust relationship between the united states and aid of person is established when that native person and roles in a tribe and i took you to be saying that the united states doesn't have any kind of trust obligation to a native person who is on unrolled and you invoke the example of those who live on the lower forty eight who are not affiliated with any tribe those strikes me as different because native alaskans it's not just a free floating group that self identifies but are put into a shareholders and thanks if they choose not to enroll in a village so i'm trying to understand how to reconcile what you said with this language and and your friend other statutes apart from where what i refer tribe but as a shareholder in ank isn't eligible for benefits you know as indians i mean it's not just about what intermediary you receive those benefits through where they receive them directly from the be i or trump how the villages might decide things but what piece of the pie goes where no i missed our viewers if this is a fundamental question by tribal sovereignty but the tribes are the sovereign congress was given the money to the sovereigns for them to make the decision i time is expired thank you thank you mr rasmussen we have a little bit of time left for any questions my colleagues may have that they didn't get a chance to get to they'll start us off i want to follow up on the question of justice barrett and justice cavanaugh were acting because i thought that's what the case was really all about in other words there are alaska natives who are not enrolled members of a village who receive significant services from and cease services so that the availability of water is directly  impacted by the covert pandemic and tens of thousands of people fit that description and i don't understand your doing what lawyers do which is trying you know to get more money for your clients but the enrolled members receive those benefits and if you prefer i gather will receive more but the alaskan natives who benefit from the services provided by the end see get will get nothing and i just wonder if that's what congress and maybe you know you're playing language argument me baby the answer is that well that doesn't matter but i wonder if there's anybody in congress who would think that alaskan natives benefit to tribal members and others who are affiliated with with the tribe the that money goes to tribes then that how the times are permitted to spend that money whether they can provide it to for example members of their community who are not in the hold or others is determined by the specific statutes at issue there are a number of statutes that certainly permit them to do that in this particular case what we have and that i think that one fundamental problem that we have here is that the actual record in this case only shows three is via contracts that  decisions we don't go to ratification we don't go to other doctrines when the language is plain this sentence construction here is very clear and therefore the court below was correct when it said this is what how this case should be decided thank you thank you counsel mr guarneri model i thank you mr chief justice i have just a couple of points to make st with respect to our primary argument that is the argument that if the recognition cause is understood to refer to a one time distribution a fund cares act incorporated a definition there which antes would be included only if theoretical point in the future congress chooses to fundamentally reinvent the concept of recognition and recognize as eligible for government to government relations these private corporation the nd point i want to address is the cares i find which about the definition of a tribal government to care is active find the tribal government in terms that are almost word for word identical to the definition of a tribal so to they have a recognized governing body for carers act purposes and rd with respect to our alternative argument mr coleman has as able to address that argument and i would just add that you know our point is simply that it's possible that different entities could demonstrate that they are recognized as eligible to participate in it contracting in different ways for the lower forty eight dollars states the paradigm is acknowledgement by the federal government for a n c s congress has already deemed them to be  special alaska clause in the s f nation and then finally on the practicalities mean many thousands of alaskan natives are not involved members of a federally recognized indian tribe and that's by design not how congress set it up  any decision finding that a n t s are ineligible to receive the scares act funds and potentially eligible to participate in the many other federal programs that rely on the same language as the s definition would have serious serious consequences for the delivery of federal services and benefits to alaska natives it would disrupt the status quo that has prevailed for for decades and we had to score to reject that interpretation and to reverse thank