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Page Number: 120

38 

HAALAND v. BRACKEEN 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

Though that case spoke of historic trust obligations, it arose
from an explicit promise to create a trust with $500,000.16 
There is little reason to view such cases as expanding Con-
gress’ powers. 

Accordingly, the context of all these cases points to lines
that are at least plausibly rooted in Founding-era practices 
and the text of the Constitution.  See Brown v. Davenport, 
596  U. S.  ___,  ___–___  (2022)  (slip  op.,  at  20–21)  (judicial 
opinions must be taken in context, not read like statutes).
Congress can regulate commerce with Indian tribes; it may
be  able  to  regulate  tribal  governments  and  lands  in 
Kagama’s vein; and it can make treaties, dispose of federal 
funds, and establish discrete trusts.17 

ICWA does not remotely resemble those practices.  It does 
not regulate commerce, tribal governments, or tribal lands. 
Nor  is  it  based  on  treaties,  federal  funds,  or  any  discrete 
trust.  By  regulating  family-law  matters  of  citizens  living 

—————— 

16 Still other cases fall somewhere in the middle of these powers, but 
they are still easily explicable by normal constitutional rules.  For exam-
ple,  United  States v. Creek Nation,  295  U. S.  103  (1935), held  that  the 
United States had to provide “just compensation” for the taking of Indian
lands—which seems equally a measure of tribal lands as it does standard
Takings Clause jurisprudence.  Id., at 110.  And Sunderland v. United 
States, 266 U. S. 226 (1924), involved conditions imposed on the purchase
of land by an Indian with funds held in trust by the Federal Government;
the funds had been acquired from the previous sale of Indian lands that 
were  themselves  likely  held  in  trust. 
Id.,  at  231–232;  see  Cohen 
§16.04[3], at 1090–1091.  Sunderland thus seems equally a measure of 
Indian lands and conditions on spending. 

17 Nor should we be unduly tripped up by broad language like “plenary” 
powers.  Prior to our 1995 decision in United States v. Lopez, 514 U. S. 
549, the Court for decades had stated that “the Commerce Clause is a 
grant of plenary authority” in the realm of interstate commerce.  See Ho-
del v. Virginia Surface Mining & Reclamation Assn., Inc., 452 U. S. 264, 
276 (1981); Maryland v. Wirtz, 392 U. S. 183, 198 (1968); United States 
v. Darby, 312 U. S. 100, 115 (1941).  Yet we then clarified that the Com-
merce Clause’s application to interstate commerce, rather than being un-
bounded, was limited only to economic activities.  See Lopez, 514 U. S., 
at 560.  Again, it is critical to read the Court’s precedents in their context.