United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit 

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No. 19-3373 

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Eugene Scalia,

 Petitioner

v. 

Red Lake Nation Fisheries, Inc., 

 Respondent 

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Appeal from the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission

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Submitted: October 22, 2020

Filed: December 4, 2020

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Before BENTON, SHEPHERD and KELLY, Circuit Judges. 

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BENTON, Circuit Judge.

 Red Lake Nation Fisheries, Inc. received two citations under the Occupational 

Safety and Health Act, 29 U.S.C. §§ 651-78. The Occupational Safety and Health 

Review Commission dismissed them. The Secretary of Labor appeals. Having 

jurisdiction under 29 U.S.C. § 660(b), this court denies the petition for review. 

 The Fishery operates on the Red Lake Indian Reservation in Minnesota. The 

Fishery is organized under tribal law. All employees are members of the Red Lake 
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Band of Chippewa Indians. Only members of the tribe own shares in the Fishery. 

The Fishery sells fish and fish-related products online, through retail outlets off the 

reservation, and directly at the Fishery’s plant on the reservation. 

On November 6, 2017, a Fishery boat capsized on the reservation in Lower 

Red Lake. Two employees drowned. OSHA inspectors entered the reservation. 

OSHA issued the Fishery two citations: (1) failure to require use of personal flotation 

devices under 29 C.F.R. § 1910.132(a); (2) failure to report death of an employee 

within eight hours under 29 C.F.R. § 1904.39(a)(1). OSHA proposed a total penalty

of $15,521. The Fishery contested the citations and the proposed penalty. The 

Secretary of Labor filed a complaint with the OSH Review Commission. The 

Fishery moved to dismiss. On August 6, 2019, the ALJ granted the motion to 

dismiss, characterizing it as a motion for summary judgment, relying on Eighth 

Circuit law. 

The Secretary of Labor argues the ALJ erred because the OSH Act applies to 

tribal businesses unless Congress says otherwise—a question of law this court 

reviews de novo. Yankton Sioux Tribe v. Podhradsky, 606 F.3d 994, 1004 (8th Cir. 

2010). 

“[G]eneral Acts of Congress apply to Indians as well as to all others in the 

absence of a clear expression to the contrary.” Federal Power Comm’n v. 

Tuscarora Indian Nation, 362 U.S. 99, 120 (1960). See generally United States v. 

Wadena, 152 F.3d 831, 841-42 (8th Cir. 1998) (applying Tuscarora to criminal law); 

Holt v. Comm’r of Internal Revenue, 364 F.2d 38, 40 (8th Cir. 1966) (applying 

Tuscarora to tax law); United States v. Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians, 827 

F.2d 380, 383 (8th Cir. 1987) (holding tribal courts are not exempt from executive 

agency record requirements). 

“This general rule in Tuscarora, however, does not apply when the interest 

sought to be affected is a specific right reserved to the Indians.” EEOC v. Fond du 

Lac Heavy Equip. & Constr. Co., 986 F.2d 246, 248 (8th Cir. 1993). Treaty rights 
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are a prime example. United States v. Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska, 542 F.2d 

1002, 1005 (8th Cir. 1976). “Specific Indian rights will not be deemed to have been 

abrogated or limited absent a ‘clear and plain’ congressional intent.” Fond du Lac, 

986 F.2d at 248, citing United States v. Dion, 476 U.S. 734, 738 (1986). “[A]reas 

traditionally left to tribal self-government, those most often the subject of treaties, 

have enjoyed an exception from the general rule that congressional enactments, in 

terms applying to all persons, includes Indians and their property interests.” Id. 

Fond du Lac involved a “strictly internal matter” of a “dispute . . . between an 

Indian applicant and an Indian tribal employer,” which the EEOC considered a 

violation of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act. Id. at 249. The business 

was located on the reservation; the applicant was a member of the tribe. Id. This 

court held: “Subjecting such an employment relationship . . . to federal control and 

supervision dilutes the sovereignty of the tribe.” Id. “Federal regulation of the tribal 

employer’s consideration of age . . . interferes with an intramural matter that has 

traditionally been left to the tribe’s self-government.” Id. Fond du Lac cited 

approvingly Donovan v. Navajo Forest Products Industries, 692 F.2d 709, 712 (10th 

Cir. 1982). Most important to the case here, this court characterized Donovan as 

similarly holding “OSHA [] inapplicable to tribe[s] in part because enforcement 

‘would dilute the principles of tribal sovereignty and self-government recognized in 

the treaty.’” Id., citing Donovan, 692 F.2d at 712. Fond du Lac declined the

narrower view of tribal sovereignty adopted in Smart v. State Farm Ins., 868 F.2d 

929, 935 (7th Cir. 1989) (later superseded by statute, see Meyers v. Oneida Tribe of 

Indians of Wisconsin, 836 F.3d 818, 827 (7th Cir. 2016)) and Donovan v. Coeur 

d'Alene Tribal Farm, 751 F.2d 1113, 1116 (9th Cir. 1985). See also Reich v. 

Mashantucket Sand & Gravel, 95 F.3d 174, 178 (2d Cir. 1996); Menominee Tribal 

Enters. v. Solis, 601 F.3d 669, 670-71 (7th Cir. 2010). 

 For a statute of general applicability to apply to Indian self-government, this 

court looks for either an “explicit statement of Congress” or “evidence of 

congressional intent to abrogate . . . in the legislative history of a statute.” Dion, 476 

U.S. at 739-40. Fond du Lac found no congressional abrogation because the only 
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evidence of intent was the similar definitions of “employer” in the Age 

Discrimination in Employment Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Fond du 

Lac, 986 F.2d at 250. The court said this evidence does not meet the “clear and plain 

intent” requirement, in part because “ambiguities of congressional intent must be 

resolved in favor of the tribal sovereignty.” Id., citing Cotton Petroleum Corp. v. 

New Mexico, 490 U.S. 163, 178 (1989). 

Fond du Lac controls this case. First, both deal with conduct of employees 

who are tribe members and commercial businesses organized under tribal law, 

located on tribal land. Second, both the ADEA and OSHA define “employer” to 

exclude “the United States, a corporation wholly owned by the Government of the 

United States, or a State or political subdivision thereof.” Compare 29 U.S.C. § 

630(b) with 29 U.S.C. § 652(5) (“[A] person engaged in a business affecting 

commerce who has employees, but does not include the United States . . . or any 

State or political subdivision of a State.”). Both statutes do not mention Indian 

commerce. The Fishery’s case is stronger than the Fond du Lac employer’s. The 

Fishery has an explicit treaty right to fish that OSH regulations would encumber, see 

United States v. White, 508 F.2d 453, 456-57 (8th Cir. 1974), while the Fond du Lac

employer had only a general right to self-govern on purely intramural affairs. See 

Fond du Lac, 986 F.2d at 248. See also United States v. Brown, 777 F.3d 1025, 

1031 (8th Cir. 2015) (suggesting the treaty right to fish is construed broadly). 

Finally, “[i]t is difficult to overstate the differences between the Red Lake 

Reservation and nearly all other Indian reservations.” Nord v. Kelly, 520 F.3d 848, 

857 (8th Cir. 2008) (Murphy, J., concurring). “It has retained much of the autonomy 

and sovereignty that existed on all reservations.” Id. “Red Lake [is] perhaps the 

most insular and nonintegrated reservation in the United States; it has also preserved 

for the band an independence not experienced on other reservations.” Id. Even if 

OSHA applied to Indian activities in other circumstances, OSHA does not apply to 
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an enterprise owned by and consisting solely of members of perhaps the most insular 

and independent sovereign tribe.1

 

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The petition for review is denied. 

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1 The Secretary of Labor discusses the general right to exclude, which this 

court need not decide.