Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-376_7l48.pdf
Page Number: 55

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

13 

GORSUCH, J., concurring 

Constitution vests in the federal government a set of potent
(but limited and enumerated) powers.  In particular, the In-
dian Commerce Clause gives Congress a robust (but not ple-
nary) power to regulate the ways in which non-Indians may 
interact with Indians.  To understand each of those pieces—
and how they fit together—is to understand why the Indian
Child Welfare Act must survive today’s legal challenge.

This  is  all  much  more  straightforward  than  it  sounds. 
Take each piece of the puzzle in turn.  Then, with the full 
constitutional  picture  assembled,  return  to  ICWA’s  provi-
sions.  By then, you will have all you need to see why the
Court upholds the law. 

A 
Start with the question how our Constitution approaches
tribal sovereignty.  In the years before Jamestown, Indian
Tribes existed as “self-governing sovereign political commu-
nities.”  United  States  v.  Wheeler,  435  U. S.  313,  322–323 
(1978).  They employed “sophisticated governmental mod-
els,”  formed  “[c]onfederacies”  with  one  another,  and  often 
engaged in decisionmaking by “consensual agreement.”  1 
B. Pritzker, Native Americans:  An Encyclopedia of History, 
Culture, and Peoples xii (1998).

When the British crossed the Atlantic, they brought with
them their own legal understandings.  A seasoned colonial 
power,  Britain  was  no  stranger  to  the  idea  of  “tributary” 
and “feudatory” states.  E. de Vattel, Law of Nations 60–61 
(1805)  (Vattel).  And  it  was  a  long-held  tenet  of  interna-
tional law that such entities do not “cease to be sovereign 
and independent” even when subject to military conquest—
at least not “so long as self government and sovereign and 
independent  authority  are  left  in  the[ir]  administration.” 
Worcester v. Georgia, 6 Pet. 515, 561 (1832).  For that rea-
son, early “history furnishes no example, from the first set-
tlement  of  our  country,  of  any  attempt  on  the  part  of  the