Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-9526_9okb.pdf
Page Number: 82

Cite as:  591 U. S. ____ (2020) 

37 

ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting 

relationship[ ] with the tribe or its members” or directly af-
fects  “the  political  integrity,  the  economic  security,  or  the
health or welfare of the tribe.”  Montana v. United States, 
450  U. S.  544,  565–566  (1981);  see  Cohen  §6.02(2)(a),  at 
506–507.  Tribes may also impose certain taxes on non-In-
dians on reservation land, see Kerr-McGee Corp. v. Navajo 
Tribe, 471 U. S. 195, 198 (1985), and in this litigation, the 
Creek Nation contends that it retains the power to tax non-
members doing business within its borders.  Brief for Mus-
cogee (Creek) Nation as Amicus Curiae 18, n. 6.  No small 
power, given that those borders now embrace three million 
acres, the city of Tulsa, and hundreds of thousands of Ok-
lahoma citizens.  Recognizing the significant “potential for
cost and conflict” caused by its decision, the Court insists
any  problems  can  be  ameliorated  if  the  citizens  of  Okla-
homa just keep up the “spirit” of cooperation behind exist-
ing intergovernmental agreements between Oklahoma and 
the  Five  Tribes.  Ante,  at  41.  But  those  agreements  are
small  potatoes  compared  to  what  will  be  necessary  to  ad-
dress the disruption inflicted by today’s decision. 

The Court responds to these and other concerns with the
truism that significant consequences are no “license for us
to disregard the law.”  Ibid.  Of course not.  But when those 
consequences  are  drastic  precisely  because  they  depart 
from  how  the  law  has  been  applied  for  more  than  a  cen-
tury—a settled understanding that our precedents demand
we consider—they are reason to think the Court may have 
taken a wrong turn in its analysis. 

* 

* 

* 

As the Creek, the State of Oklahoma, the United States, 
and  our  judicial  predecessors  have  long  agreed,  Congress
disestablished any Creek reservation more than 100 years 
ago.  Oklahoma  therefore  had  jurisdiction  to  prosecute 
McGirt.  I respectfully dissent.