Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-429_8o6a.pdf
Page Number: 49.0

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

21 

GORSUCH, J., dissenting 

[Oklahoma] constitution shall be construed . . . to limit or 
affect the authority of the Government of the United States
to  make  any  law  or  regulation  respecting  such  Indians, 
their  lands,  property,  or  other  rights  by  treaties,  agree-
ment, law, or otherwise, which it would have been compe-
tent  to  make  if  this  Act  had  never  been  passed.”  34  Stat. 
267–268 (emphasis added).  Prior to statehood, too, no one 
could  have  questioned  Congress’s  exclusive  authority  to
regulate tribal lands and affairs in the Oklahoma territory.
See,  e.g.,  U. S.  Const.,  Art. IV;  Kagama,  118  U. S.,  at  380 
(citing  federal  government’s  “exclusive  sovereignty”  over
federal  territories);  Simms  v.  Simms,  175  U. S.  162,  168 
(1899)  (“In  the  Territories  of  the  United  States,  Congress 
has the entire dominion and sovereignty, . . . Federal and 
state”); Harjo v. Kleppe, 420 F. Supp. 1110, 1121 (DC 1976) 
(federal  courts  had  pre-statehood  jurisdiction);  Clinton
960–962.  The  Oklahoma  Enabling  Act  and  the  commit-
ments  it  demanded  in  the  new  Oklahoma  Constitution 
sought to maintain this status quo.

Recognizing the point, this Court has explained that, “[i]n
passing the enabling act for the admission of the State of 
Oklahoma . . . Congress was careful to preserve the author-
ity of the Government of the United States over the Indians, 
their lands and property, which it had prior to the passage 
of the act.”  Tiger v. Western Investment Co., 221 U. S. 286, 
309  (1911)  (emphasis  added).  This  Court  has  explained,
too, that the “grant of statehood” to Oklahoma did nothing 
to disturb “the long-settled rule” that the “guardianship of 
the  United  States”  over  Native  American  Tribes  in  Okla-
homa “has not been abandoned.”  United States v. Ramsey, 
271 U. S. 467, 469 (1926).  Instead, this Court has acknowl-
edged,  the  federal  government’s  “authority  in  respect  of
crimes committed by or against Indians continued after the
admission of the state as it was before.”  Ibid.  In fact, the 
Court has long interpreted nearly identical language in the