Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-493_jgko.pdf
Page Number: 3.0

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

3 

Syllabus 

another statutory term.  Gustafson v. Alloyd Co., 513 U. S. 561, 575. 
Indeterminacy aside, the State’s interpretation would leave subsection 
(b)—denying  the  State  regulatory  jurisdiction—with  no work  to  per-
form.  As a result, Texas’s interpretation also defies another canon of 
statutory  construction—the  rule  that  courts  must  normally  seek  to 
construe Congress’s work “so that effect is given to all provisions.”  Cor-
ley v. United States, 556 U. S. 303, 314 (internal quotation marks omit-
ted).  Seeking to give subsection (b) real work to perform, Texas sub-
mits  that  the  provision  serves  to  deny  its  state  courts  and  gaming
commission  “jurisdiction”  to  punish  violations  of  subsection  (a)  by
sending such disputes to federal court instead.  But that interpretation 
only serves to render subsection (c), which grants federal courts “ex-
clusive” jurisdiction over subsection (a) violations, a nullity.  A full look 
at the statute’s structure suggests a set of simple and coherent com-
mands; Texas’s competing interpretation renders individual statutory
terms  duplicative  and  leaves  whole  provisions  without  work  to  per-
form.  Pp. 8–12. 

(b) Important  contextual  clues  resolve  any  remaining  questions. 
Congress  passed  the  Restoration  Act  six  months  after  this  Court 
handed  down  its  decision  in  California  v.  Cabazon  Band  of  Mission 
Indians, 480 U. S. 202.  There, the Court interpreted Public Law 280—
a statute Congress had adopted in 1953 to allow a handful of States to
enforce some of their criminal laws on certain tribal lands—to mean 
that only “prohibitory” state gaming laws could be applied on the In-
dian lands in question, not state “regulatory” gaming laws.  The Cab-
azon Court held that California’s bingo laws—materially identical to 
Texas’s laws here—fell on the regulatory side of the ledger.  This Court 
generally assumes that, when Congress enacts statutes, it is aware of 
this Court’s relevant precedents.  Ryan v. Valencia Gonzales, 568 U. S. 
57,  66.  At  the  time  Congress  adopted  the  Restoration  Act, Cabazon 
was not only a relevant precedent; it was the precedent.  In Cabazon’s 
immediate  aftermath,  Congress  also  adopted  other  laws  governing
tribal gaming that appeared to reference and employ in different ways 
Cabazon’s  distinction  between  prohibition  and  regulation.  See,  e.g., 
Wampanoag Tribal Council of Gay Head, Inc., Indian Claims Settle-
ment Act of 1987, §9, 101 Stat. 709–710. 

None of this is to say that the Tribe may offer gaming on whatever 
terms it wishes.  The Restoration Act provides that a gaming activity
prohibited by Texas law is also prohibited on tribal land as a matter of 
federal law.  Other gaming activities are subject to tribal regulation
and must conform to the terms and conditions set forth in federal law, 
including IGRA to the extent applicable.  Pp. 12–15. 

(c) The State’s remaining arguments are unavailing.  Pp. 15–19.