Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/472/237/
Timestamp: 2019-12-15 18:05:06
Document Index: 548580594

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 17', '§ 47', '§ 322', '§ 1', '§ 323', '§ 162', '§ 16']

Mountain States Tel. v. Santana Ana :: 472 U.S. 237 (1985) :: Justia US Supreme Court Center
Justia › US Law › US Case Law › US Supreme Court › Volume 472 › Mountain States Tel. v. Santana Ana
As it came to us on petition for a writ of certiorari, this case involved an obscure statute that related only to the 19 Pueblo Tribes in New Mexico. With but one or two exceptions, it never had been used to sanction outright alienation of tribal lands, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/60|>n. 60, supra, and it had been used to convey lesser interests approximately 80 times in its 60-year history. Moreover, the statute had fallen into virtually complete disuse and oblivion for the last two generations. We also were advised that the question presented -- however important to the individual Tribes and companies involved -- nevertheless implicated little more than a handful of easements. [Footnote 2/71] And, we were advised, most of those easements already had been renegotiated (under the general provisions, not § 17). [Footnote 2/72]
1 L. Kelly, Section 17 of the Pueblo Lands Act: A Study of Legislative History and Administrative Practice 7, 21 (unpublished manuscript 1984) (Kelly); 2 id. at 128-135 (Exs. 27-29). See 472 U.S. 237fn2/34|>n. 34, infra.
Letter from Francis C. Wilson to Charles H. Burke, at 1 (Dec. 18, 1923), reprinted in 2 Kelly 35 (Ex. 37). See 472 U.S. 237fn2/31|>n. 31, infra.
The Court believes that Congress intended to "adop[t] a new rule of law," rather than to "apply the Nonintercourse Act to these lands." Ante at 472 U. S. 250, 472 U. S. 251. See also ante at 472 U. S. 244, n. 17 ("The Act itself did not purport to resolve the question whether the Nonintercourse Act applied to the Pueblos"). But Congress already had extended the Nonintercourse Act to the Pueblos in both the 1851 Act, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/8|>n. 8, supra, and in the 1910 Enabling Act, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/10|>n. 10, supra. During the legislative hearings leading to the Pueblo Lands Act, it was agreed that Congress already had preempted this matter. See, e.g., 1923 Senate Hearings, at 155. See also S.Rep. No. 492, 68th Cong., 1st Sess., 3 (1924) (question had been "finally determined" by Sandoval in 1913). Until today, the Court has consistently acknowledged this effect of the 1851 and 1910 Acts. See cases cited in 472 U.S. 237fn2/9|>n. 9, supra.
See 2A C. Sands, Sutherland on Statutory Construction § 47.16 (4th ed.1984). See also infra at 472 U. S. 277, and 472 U.S. 237fn2/65|>n. 65.
Act of Apr. 21, 1928, 45 Stat. 442, as amended, 25 U.S.C. § 322. Although the Department had consistently applied the general easement and right-of-way statutes to the Pueblos, a new Special Assistant to the Attorney General concluded in 1926 that, as a result of the peculiar wording of the Act of Mar. 2, 1899, pertaining to railroad rights-of-way, "[i]t is not quite certain that it does not include them, but it looks as though it did not." See infra at 472 U. S. 271, and 472 U.S. 237fn2/39|>n. 39. On the premise that the 1899 Act was "probably not sufficiently broad to cover the matter," H.R.Rep. No. 955, 69th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1926), Congress enacted emergency legislation authorizing condemnation proceedings in federal district court against Pueblo lands. The Act was invalidated as a result of procedural defects, see H.R.Rep. No. 816, 70th Cong., 1st Sess., 1 (1928), and Congress subsequently enacted the 1928 Act to clarify that the general easement and right-of-way provisions were "applicable to the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico," ibid.
Act of Feb. 5, 1948, §§ 1, 2, 62 Stat. 17-18, 25 U.S.C. §§ 323, 324. Five of the nineteen Pueblo Tribes organized under the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/16|>n. 16, supra. H.R.Conf.Rep. No. 94-1439, p. 4 (1976). The Department has long extended this consent requirement to rights-of-way over all Pueblo lands. See 25 CFR §§ 162.2-162.5 (1985).
The reference is to John Collier, who became Commissioner of Indian Affairs in 1933. Collier and organizations that he represented were opposed to further alienation of the Indian tribal base, and they played an active role in the enactment of the Pueblo Lands Act. 1 Kelly 5-20. Many of Collier's views against further alienation became law upon enactment of the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/16|>n. 16, supra. See generally Cohen 144-149.
In light of the canons of construction requiring (1) a "plain and unambiguous" expression of congressional intent to lift restraints on alienation, see infra at 472 U. S. 275-279, and (2) that all ambiguities in legislation be resolved in favor of preserving Indian rights and title, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/66|>n. 66, infra, this is not an appropriate case for invoking the usual rules of deference to administrative actions. See generally Morton v. Ruiz, 415 U. S. 199, 415 U. S. 236-237 (1974); Cohen, 225-228.
The Court's purported concern for deferring to "individuals [who] were far more likely to have had an understanding of the actual intent of Congress," ante at 472 U. S. 254-255, might have been better directed to the panel that decided Alonzo. Chief Judge Bratton was a former United States Senator from New Mexico, and had sponsored the 1928 Pueblo right-of-way legislation, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/19|>n.19, supra, and the 1933 amendment to § 16 of the Pueblo Lands Act, see 472 U.S. 237fn2/20|>n. 20, supra. Judge Phillips had been one of the two District Court judges who heard the quiet title suits under the Pueblo Lands Act. Judge Breitenstein, the third panel member, authored the opinion below in the instant case.