Source: https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/430-u-s-584-606841046
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 14:11:07+00:00

Document:
Both the language and legislative history of the Acts of 1904, 1907, and 1910, whereby land in certain counties in South Dakota located within the boundaries of the Rosebud Sioux Reservation as defined in an 1889 Treaty was required to be ceded by the Reservation Indians to the Government for sale to settlers under the homestead and townsite laws with the proceeds to be credited to the Indians only as received or, with respect to certain parcels, for transfer to South Dakota for school use, held clearly to evidence a congressional intent to diminish the boundaries of the Reservation. Although such Acts were unilateral Acts of Congress without the consent of three-fourths of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe's adult male members, as was required by the original 1868 Treaty establishing the Reservation, that fact does not directly bear on the question whether Congress, by these later Acts, intended to diminish the Reservation boundaries. Nor is it conclusive with respect to congressional intent that these Acts changed the method of payment from an outright, fixed-sum payment to the Indians required by a 1901 Agreement that would have amended the 1889 Treaty and would have resulted in a diminution of the Reservation boundaries, but which, although approved by three-fourths of the Tribe's adult male members, was never ratified by Congress. Pp. 586-615.
REHNQUIST, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which BURGER, C.J., and WHITE, BLACKMUN, POWELL, and STEVENS, JJ., joined. MARSHALL, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BRENNAN and STEWART, JJ., joined, post, p. 615.
Mattz v. Arnett, supra at 505, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
When established, the Rosebud Indian Reservation contained somewhat over 3.2 million acres, and covered all or a portion of what later became five counties in South Dakota: Gregory, Tripp, Lyman, Mellette, and Todd. The three Acts we are asked to construe successively disposed of all unallotted lands in Gregory County (1904 Act), in Tripp and Lyman Counties (1907 Act), and in Mellette County (1910 Act). Only Todd County remains unaffected by these post-1889 enactments. The contention of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe is that these Acts, while opening up the unallotted land outside of Todd County to non-Indian settlement, did not thereby change the Reservation boundaries, which continued to encompass these five counties.
the general rule that "[d]oubtful expressions are to be resolved in favor of the weak and defenseless people who are the wards of the nation, dependent upon its protection and good faith."
status. Mattz v. Arnett, supra; see also Seymour v. Superintendent, 368 U.S. 351 (1962). But the "general rule" does not command a determination that reservation status survives in the face of congressionally manifested intent to the contrary. DeCoteau v. District County Court, supra. In all cases, "the face of the Act," the "surrounding circumstances," and the "legislative history," are to be examined with an eye toward determining what congressional intent was. Mattz v. Arnett, supra at 505.
The Rosebud Sioux are one of the tribes of Indians of the Sioux Nation. The Treaty of April 29, 1868, 15 Stat. 635, set aside all the land in South Dakota west of the Missouri River as the Great Sioux Reservation, consisting of some 25 million acres. Article 12 of the Treaty provided that no subsequent treaty for the cession of any part of the reservation would be valid without the written consent of three-fourths of the adult male Indians on the reservation. Despite this provision, in 1877, approximately 7.5 million acres, consisting of the Black Hills portion of the Great Sioux Reservation, were removed from the Reservation by the Act of February 28, 1877, 19 Stat. 254. See Sioux Tribe of Indians v. United States, 97 Ct.Cl. 613 (1942), cert. denied, 318 U.S. 789 (1943). Of the remaining Reservation, approximately one-half was "restored to the public domain" under the Act of March 2, 1889, 25 Stat. 896, § 21,5 while six separate Reservations were carved out of the remainder, §§ 1-6. Section 2 set apart the Rosebud Reservation, encompassing what were later organized as three full counties (Todd, Mellette, and Tripp), a major portion of Gregory County, and a small portion of Lyman.6 This Reservation, as originally delimited, contained over 3.2 [97 S.Ct. 1365] million acres.

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