Opinion ID: 160520
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Choctaw Nation's Criminal Jurisdiction Over Intratribal Matters Is Inherent In Tribal Sovereignty

Text: 11 Plaintiffs argue that the district court erred in dismissing their claims against the tribal defendants because the tribal defendants are actually not tribal defendants at all, but rather, agents of the federal government. In Bivens v. Six Unknown Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388, 397 (1971), the Supreme Court held that individuals who suffer violations of the United States Constitution by agents of the federal government may sue for damages in federal court. Despite Plaintiffs' failure to cite Bivens at any point in their brief, we construe their constitutional claims against the tribal defendants alleged to be agents of the federal government as Bivens claims. 12 Plaintiffs' first contention on appeal is that the Choctaw Nation is exercising contracted federal criminal jurisdiction because the Choctaw citizens did not grant criminal jurisdiction to the tribal government under the 1983 Choctaw Constitution. Aplt. Br. at 6. We read this as a two-part argument. First, Plaintiffs claim that the Choctaw Nation has no criminal jurisdiction over its members. Implicitly acknowledging that such jurisdiction is inherent in tribal sovereignty, Plaintiffs argue that the Choctaw Nation has waived that aspect of its sovereignty. Id. at 9-10. Second, Plaintiffs contend that the federal government delegated the power to exercise federal criminal jurisdiction to the Tribe by establishing the Choctaw Court of Indian Offenses, which functions as an instrumentality of the federal government. Id. at 10-11. 13 It is undisputed that Indian tribes have power to enforce their criminal laws against tribe members. United States v. Wheeler, 435 U.S. 313, 322 (1978); accord Montana v. United States, 450 U.S. 544, 563 (1981). The Supreme Court has squarely rejected the argument that this power derives from a delegation by the federal government, holding instead that the power is inherent in tribal sovereignty. Wheeler, 435 U.S. at 322-23; see also 25 U.S.C. 1301(2) (defining powers of self-government to include the inherent power of Indian tribes, hereby recognized and affirmed, to exercise criminal jurisdiction over all Indians). Indian tribes continue to possess all aspects of sovereignty not withdrawn by treaty or statute, or by implication as a necessary result of their dependent status. Wheeler, 435 U.S. at 323. 14 Plaintiffs do not argue that the inherent criminal jurisdiction of the Choctaw Nation was withdrawn by treaty or statute. Nor do they -- or could they -- contend that such jurisdiction is inconsistent with the Tribe's dependent status. See id. at 326 ([T]he sovereign power of a tribe to prosecute its members for tribal offenses clearly does not fall within that part of sovereignty which the Indians implicitly lost by virtue of their dependent status.). Instead, Plaintiffs argue that the Choctaw Nation waived its jurisdiction in 1983 when it adopted a constitution that did not explicitly declare the Tribe's power to make and enforce criminal laws. Aplt. Br. at 9-10. 15 The question of whether an Indian tribe may waive a sovereign power by failing to enumerate it in a tribal constitution is a legal question, which we review de novo. Cf., e.g., Fletcher, 116 F.3d at 1323-24 (We review de novo the legal question of when a party can assert sovereign immunity.). The Supreme Court has held that a tribal constitution's silence regarding a particular sovereign power does not constitute a waiver of that power. See Merrion v. Jicarilla Apache Tribe, 455 U.S. 130, 148 & n.14 (1982) (rejecting silence as waiver argument in context of sovereign power to tax). To explain its holding, the Court noted that neither the Tribe's Constitution nor the Federal Constitution is the font of any sovereign power of the Indian tribes. Because the Tribe retains all inherent attributes of sovereignty that have not been divested by the Federal Government, the proper inference from silence on this point is that the [unenumerated] sovereign power remains intact. Id. at 148 n.14 (citations omitted). 16 The Supreme Court's holding in Merrion is controlling in this case. The Choctaw Nation's failure to explicitly describe the Nation's inherent criminal jurisdiction in its constitution did not (and, per Merrion, could not) effect a waiver of that power. Therefore, there is no set of facts that could have been alleged in support of this claim that would entitle the plaintiffs to relief, and dismissal for failure to state a claim and for lack of jurisdiction was proper. Seamons, 84 F.3d at 1231. In light of our holding that the Choctaw Nation has inherent criminal jurisdiction over its members and that such jurisdiction has been neither waived by the Tribe nor abrogated by Congress, we need not reach Plaintiffs' argument that the Choctaw Court of Indian Offenses, established pursuant to a Choctaw/BIA contract under the Indian Law Enforcement Act (ILEA), is a federal instrumentality exercising federal jurisdiction. In sum, we hold as a matter of law that at all times relevant to this action, the tribal defendants acted as agents of the Tribe pursuant to their inherent sovereign power to exercise criminal jurisdiction over intratribal offenses. Accordingly, we reject Plaintiffs' first and second contentions on appeal.