Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-376_7l48.pdf
Page Number: 3.0

Cite as:  599 U. S. ____ (2023) 

3 

Syllabus 

Held: 

1. The  Court  declines  to  disturb  the  Fifth  Circuit’s  conclusion 
that ICWA is consistent with Congress’s Article I authority.  Pp. 10–
17. 

(a) The Court has characterized Congress’s power to legislate with
respect to the Indian tribes as “plenary and exclusive,” United States 
v. Lara, 541 U. S. 193, 200, superseding both tribal and state authority, 
Santa Clara Pueblo v. Martinez, 436 U. S. 49, 56.  The Court has traced 
that  power  to  multiple  sources.    First,  the  Indian  Commerce  Clause 
authorizes  Congress  “[t]o  regulate  Commerce  . . .  with  the  Indian 
Tribes,” U. S. Const., Art. I, §8, cl. 3, and the Court has interpreted the 
Indian Commerce Clause to reach not only trade, but also certain “In-
dian  affairs,”  Cotton  Petroleum  Corp.  v.  New  Mexico,  490  U. S.  163, 
192.  The Treaty Clause provides a second source of power.  The treaty 
power “does not literally authorize Congress to act legislatively,” since 
it is housed in Article II, but “treaties  made pursuant to that power
can  authorize  Congress  to  deal  with  ‘matters’  with  which  otherwise 
‘Congress could not deal.’ ”  Lara, 541 U. S., at 201.  Also, principles
inherent in the Constitution’s structure may empower Congress to act
in the field of Indian affairs.  See Morton v. Mancari, 417 U. S. 535, 
551–552.  Finally, the “trust relationship between the United States
and  the  Indian  people”  informs  the  exercise  of  legislative  power. 
United States v. Mitchell, 463 U. S. 206, 225–226.  In sum, Congress’s
power to legislate with respect to Indians is well established and broad, 
but  it  is  not  unbounded.    It  is  plenary  within  its  sphere,  but  even  a 
sizeable sphere has borders.  Pp. 10–14.

(b) Petitioners  contend  that  ICWA  impermissibly  treads  on  the 
States’ traditional authority over family law.  But when Congress val-
idly legislates pursuant to its Article I powers, the Court “has not hes-
itated” to find conflicting state family law preempted, “[n]otwithstand-
ing  the  limited  application  of  federal  law  in  the  field  of  domestic 
relations generally.”  Ridgway v. Ridgway, 454 U. S. 46, 54.  And the 
Court has recognized Congress’s power to displace the jurisdiction of 
state courts in adoption proceedings involving Indian children.  Fisher 
v. District Court of Sixteenth Judicial Dist. of Mont., 424 U. S. 382, 390 
(per curiam).  Pp. 14–15. 

(c) Petitioners contend that no source of congressional authority 
authorizes  Congress  to  regulate  custody  proceedings  for  Indian  chil-
dren.   They  suggest  that  the  Indian  Commerce  Clause,  for  example, 
authorizes Congress to legislate only with respect to Indian tribes as
government entities, not Indians as individuals.  But this Court’s hold-
ing more than a century ago that “commerce with the Indian tribes, 
means commerce with the individuals composing those tribes,” United 
States v. Holliday, 3 Wall. 407, 417, renders that argument a dead end.