Federal Register / Vol. 79, No. 239 / Friday, December 12, 2014 / Notices 73905 

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE 

Office of the Attorney General 

[AG Order No. 3481–2014] 

Attorney General Guidelines Stating 

Principles for Working With Federally 

Recognized Indian Tribes 

AGENCY: Office of the Attorney General, 

Department of Justice. 

ACTION: Notice. 

SUMMARY: The Attorney General is 

issuing guidelines stating principles for 

working with federally recognized 

Indian tribes. 

DATES: This notice is effective December 

3, 2014. 

ADDRESSES: Mr. Tracy Toulou, Director, 

Office of Tribal Justice, Department of 

Justice, 950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., 

Room 2310, Washington, DC 20530, 

email OTJ@usdoj.gov. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. 

Tracy Toulou, Director, Office of Tribal 

Justice, Department of Justice, at (202) 

514–8812 (not a toll-free number) or 

OTJ@usdoj.gov. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The 

Attorney General Guidelines state the 

following principles for working with 

federally recognized Indian tribes: 

Overarching Principles 

• The Department of Justice honors 

and strives to act in accordance with the 

general trust relationship between the 

United States and tribes. 

• The Department of Justice is 

committed to furthering the 

government-to-government relationship 

with each tribe, which forms the heart 

of our federal Indian policy. 

• The Department of Justice respects 

and supports tribes’ authority to 

exercise their inherent sovereign 

powers, including powers over both 

their citizens and their territory. 

• The Department of Justice promotes 

and pursues the objectives of the United 

Nations Declaration on the Rights of 

Indigenous Peoples. 

• The Department of Justice is 

committed to tribal self-determination, 

tribal autonomy, tribal nation-building, 

and the long-term goal of maximizing 

tribal control over governmental 

institutions in tribal communities, 

because tribal problems generally are 

best addressed by tribal solutions, 

including solutions informed by tribal 

traditions and custom. 

Consultation and Communication With 

Tribes 

• The Department of Justice 

recognizes that its commitment to tribal 

self-determination requires regular, 

meaningful, and informed consultation 

with American Indian and Alaska 

Native tribal officials when developing 

new or amended policies, regulations, 

and legislative actions initiated by the 

Department that may affect tribes, as 

detailed in the Department’s Policy 

Statement on Tribal Consultation. 

• The Department of Justice 

recognizes that—in addition to, but not 

in lieu of, formal consultation—there 

can be great benefit in timely, detailed, 

informal communications with tribal 

officials and other community leaders. 

• The Department of Justice supports 

the Attorney General’s Tribal Nations 

Leadership Council and other task 

forces and advisory groups that allow 

elected tribal representatives to provide 

direct input to the Department’s leaders 

and components. 

Culture and Mutual Respect 

• The Department of Justice 

recognizes that each tribe’s history and 

contemporary culture are unique, and 

that solutions that work for one tribe 

may not be suitable for others. 

• The Department of Justice works to 

respectfully consider traditional tribal 

cultural practices and values, and is 

sensitive to the need for effective crosscultural communication. 

• The Department of Justice seeks to 

foster an internal Departmental culture, 

from top to bottom, that will encourage 

its officers and employees to identify 

and be responsive to the needs of tribes 

routinely, not merely as an afterthought. 

Law Enforcement and Litigation 

• The Department of Justice is 

committed to helping protect all Native 

Americans from violence, takes 

seriously its role in enforcing federal 

criminal laws that apply in Indian 

country, and recognizes that, absent the 

Department’s action, some serious 

crimes might go unaddressed. 

• The Department of Justice 

prioritizes helping protect Native 

American women and children from 

violence and exposure to violence, and 

works with tribes to hold perpetrators 

accountable, to protect victims, and to 

reduce the incidence of domestic 

violence, sexual assault, and child abuse 

and neglect in tribal communities. 

• The Department of Justice is 

committed to protecting tribal treaty 

rights, tribal lands and natural 

resources, and tribal jurisdiction 

through litigation, where appropriate, 

and to handling litigation involving 

tribes in a manner that is mindful of the 

government-to-government relationship. 

• The Department of Justice promotes 

the proper application of the Indian 

Child Welfare Act of 1978 (ICWA), and 

seeks to protect tribes and Native 

American families from unwarranted 

removal of their children. 

• The Department of Justice works to 

safeguard the civil rights of Native 

Americans by prosecuting hate crimes, 

protecting the right to vote, and 

otherwise helping ensure that Native 

Americans are free from illegal 

discrimination. 

Nation-Building and Tribal Justice 

Systems 

• The Department of Justice believes 

that stable funding at sufficient levels 

for essential tribal justice functions is 

critical to the long-term growth of tribal 

institutions. 

• The Department of Justice seeks to 

increase tribes’ flexibility to administer 

grant programs and thus design 

solutions appropriate to their 

communities, while ensuring strict 

accountability. 

• The Department of Justice believes 

that pilot and demonstration projects 

that are available to state or local 

governments should be available to 

similarly situated tribal governments, 

and endeavors, where appropriate and 

practicable, to give serious 

consideration to locating projects in 

tribal communities. 

• The Department of Justice is 

committed to fully implementing the 

Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968 (ICRA), 

the Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010 

(TLOA), and the Violence Against 

Women Reauthorization Act of 2013 

(VAWA), and believes that working 

with tribes to strengthen their justice 

systems, including indigent defense 

services, is critical to fulfilling the 

promise of these statutes. 

• The Department of Justice supports 

tribes’ efforts to build innovative 

approaches to law enforcement, public 

safety, and victim services, and, where 

appropriate, to evaluate those 

approaches by collecting empirical 

evidence and conducting scientific and 

statistical research. 

Coordination and Outreach 

• The Department of Justice, when 

working with other federal agencies on 

issues involving tribes, advocates 

respecting tribal self-determination, 

tribal autonomy, tribal nation-building, 

and the government-to-government 

relationship. 

• The Department of Justice works to 

facilitate communication and build 

relationships among the federal agencies 

engaged with tribal governments and to 

promote the sharing of federal resources 

and expertise. 

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73906 Federal Register / Vol. 79, No. 239 / Friday, December 12, 2014 / Notices 

• The Department of Justice works to 

facilitate communication and build 

relationships between tribes and state, 

local, and private partners in law 

enforcement, public safety, victim 

services, and civil rights, to promote 

prosperous and resilient tribal 

communities, and to use dispute 

resolution techniques such as mediation 

to resolve community conflicts and 

tensions. 

• The Department of Justice 

recognizes the link between healthy, 

prospering families and public safety, 

and the need to coordinate law 

enforcement efforts with educational, 

housing, environmental-protection, and 

public-health services. 

Sustainability 

• The Department of Justice will 

continue taking steps to institutionalize 

its commitment to tribal justice and to 

make its officers and employees aware 

of these Attorney General Guidelines 

stating principles for working with 

federally recognized Indian tribes, so 

that progress in areas important to tribes 

continues regardless of changes in 

Department personnel. 

These guidelines and principles are 

intended to improve the internal 

management of the Department of 

Justice. They are not intended to and do 

not create any right or benefit, 

substantive or procedural, enforceable at 

law or in equity by any party in any 

matter, civil or criminal, against the 

United States, its departments, agencies, 

or entities, its officers, employees, or 

agents, or any other person, nor do these 

guidelines or principles place any 

limitations on otherwise lawful 

litigative prerogatives of the Department 

of Justice. Please contact the 

Department’s Office of Tribal Justice 

(OTJ) with any questions about these 

guidelines and principles. 

Dated: December 3, 2014. 

Eric H. Holder, Jr., 

Attorney General. 

[FR Doc. 2014–28903 Filed 12–11–14; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 4410–A5–P 

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE 

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, 

and Explosives 

[Docket No. ATF 2014R–50N] 

Granting of Relief; Federal Firearms 

Privileges 

AGENCY: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, 

Firearms and Explosives (ATF), 

Department of Justice. 

ACTION: Notice of granting of restoration 

of Federal firearms privileges. 

SUMMARY: Northrop Grumman Systems 

Corporation (NGSC), a wholly owned 

subsidiary of Northrop Grumman 

Corporation (NGC), has been granted 

relief from the disabilities imposed by 

Federal laws by the Director of ATF 

with respect to the acquisition, receipt, 

transfer, shipment, transportation, or 

possession of firearms. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Shermaine Kenner, Enforcement 

Programs and Services; Bureau of 

Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and 

Explosives; U.S. Department of Justice; 

99 New York Avenue NE., Washington, 

DC 20226; telephone (202) 648–7070. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The 

Attorney General is responsible for 

enforcing the provisions of the Gun 

Control Act of 1968 (GCA), 18 U.S.C. 

Chapter 44. He has delegated that 

responsibility to the Director of ATF, 

subject to the direction of the Attorney 

General and the Deputy Attorney 

General. 28 CFR 0.130(a). ATF has 

promulgated regulations that implement 

the provisions of the GCA in 27 CFR 

part 478. 

Section 922(g) of the GCA prohibits 

certain persons from shipping or 

transporting any firearm in interstate or 

foreign commerce, or receiving any 

firearm which has been shipped or 

transported in interstate or foreign 

commerce, or possessing any firearm in 

or affecting commerce. These 

prohibitions apply to any person who— 

(1) Has been convicted in any court of 

a crime punishable by 

imprisonment for a term exceeding 

one year; 

(2) Is a fugitive from justice; 

(3) Is an unlawful user of or addicted to 

any controlled substance; 

(4) Has been adjudicated as a mental 

defective or committed to a mental 

institution; 

(5) Is an alien illegally or unlawfully in 

the United States or, with certain 

exceptions, aliens admitted to the 

United States under a 

nonimmigrant visa; 

(6) Has been discharged from the Armed 

Forces under dishonorable 

conditions; 

(7) Having been a citizen of the United 

States, has renounced U.S. 

citizenship; 

(8) Is subject to a court order that 

restrains the person from harassing, 

stalking, or threatening an intimate 

partner or child of such intimate 

partner; or 

(9) Has been convicted in any court of 

a misdemeanor crime of domestic 

violence. 

The term ‘‘person’’ is defined in 

section 921(a)(1) as including ‘‘any 

individual, corporation, company, 

association, firm, partnership, society, 

or joint stock company.’’ Section 925(c) 

of the GCA provides that a person who 

is prohibited from possessing, shipping, 

transporting, or receiving firearms or 

ammunition may make application to 

the Attorney General to remove the 

firearms disabilities imposed under 

section 922(g) ‘‘if it is established to his 

satisfaction that the circumstances 

regarding the disability, and the 

applicant’s record and reputation, are 

such that the applicant will not be likely 

to act in a manner dangerous to public 

safety and that the granting of the relief 

would not be contrary to the public 

interest.’’ The Attorney General has 

delegated the authority to grant relief 

from firearms disabilities to the Director 

of ATF. 

Section 925(c) further provides that 

‘‘[w]henever the Attorney General grants 

relief to any person pursuant to this 

section he shall promptly publish in the 

Federal Register notice of such action, 

together with the reasons therefor.’’ 

Regulations implementing the 

provisions of section 925(c) are set forth 

in 27 CFR 478.144. 

Since 1992, Congress has eliminated 

funding for ATF to investigate or act 

upon applications for relief from federal 

firearms disabilities submitted by 

individuals. However, since 1993, 

Congress has authorized funding for 

ATF to investigate and act upon 

applications filed by corporations for 

relief from Federal firearms disabilities. 

An application to ATF for relief from 

Federal firearms disabilities under 18 

U.S.C. 925(c) was submitted for NGSC. 

In the matter under review, between 

1993 and 2002, NGSC, a wholly owned 

subsidiary of NGC, merged with and 

succeeded the assets and business 

operations of three non-surviving 

entities that had been convicted in 

Federal court of crimes punishable by 

imprisonment for a term exceeding one 

year. Specifically, TRW Electronic 

Products, Inc. was convicted on 

September 25, 1987, in the United 

States District Court for the District of 

Colorado, Case No. 87 CR–250, for 

violations of 18 U.S.C. 2 and 1001. 

TRW, Inc. was convicted on August 25, 

1988, in the United States District Court 

for the Northern District of Ohio for a 

violation of 18 U.S.C. 371. Litton 

Applied Technology Division was 

convicted on June 30, 1999, in the 

United States District Court for the 

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