Opinion ID: 626865
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: State Enforcement Power

Text: Defendants' final argument is that Washington does not have the power to enforce its tax laws against them, either because the taxes violate the Treaty at Point Elliott, or because Washington lacks such power under its own state law.
A federal statute of general applicability that is silent on the issue of applicability to Indian tribes will not apply to them if . . . the application of the law to the tribe would abrogate rights guaranteed by Indian treaties. Baker, 63 F.3d at 1485 (internal quotation marks omitted). The CCTA is a federal law of general applicability. Id. at 1484-85. Defendants argue that the Swinomish Tribe reserved the right to trade cigarettes free from taxation at the time the Tribe signed the Treaty at Point Elliott in 1855. The Treaty contains only one clause related to trade: The said tribes and bands further agree not to trade at Vancouver's Island or elsewhere out of the dominions of the United States, nor shall foreign Indians be permitted to reside in their reservations without consent of the superintendent or agent. Because rights not explicitly abrogated in a treaty are presumed to have been reserved by the tribe, see Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, 526 U.S. 172, 195-96, 119 S.Ct. 1187, 143 L.Ed.2d 270 (1999), Defendants argue that if the Swinomish had a right to trade in tobacco at the time of the Treaty, they retain that right today. Defendants introduced the testimony of Dr. Daniel Boxberger concerning trading activities of the Swinomish in the mid-nineteenth century. Dr. Boxberger's testimony was the only evidence on this issue. Based on his testimony, the district court made the following findings of fact: 1. Dr. Boxberger is the Chair of the Department of Anthropology at Western Washington University and has an expertise in the area of the economics of native peoples in Washington at the time of treaties in the Nineteenth Century. 2. The native peoples who were the ancestors of the Swinomish Tribe resided along the Puget Sound. For the sake of simplicity the Court refers to all such peoples as Swinomish. 3. Dr. Boxberger has studied the culture and history of the Swinomish and has an extensive knowledge of the negotiations of the Treaty at Point Elliott. 4. The Swinomish were actively engaged in trade at the time of Treaty in 1855. 5. The Swinomish traded at many trading posts with the Hudson's Bay Company throughout the Puget Sound area and at Vancouver's Island. 6. The Swinomish traded furs and other goods. 7. This trade was important to the Swinomish. 8. Tobacco was a form of currency in the mid-Nineteenth Century. 9. The Hudson's Bay Company traded tobacco for furs with the Swinomish. 10. The Swinomish traded tobacco for other goods with Indians and non-Indians. 11. At the time of Treaty there were no excise taxes. 12. The Swinomish neither paid nor collected taxes as part of their trade at the time of Treaty. 13. The Swinomish signatories did not understand the Treaty at Point Elliott as restricting their trading practices. 14. Neither the Swinomish nor the United States negotiators anticipated any taxation on the trade of goods at the time of Treaty. 15. The State of Washington did not exist in 1855. The district court concluded from these factual findings that the Swinomish signatories to the Treaty at Point Elliott would not have intended to submit to be restricted in their trade in tobacco or other tribal products. The district court concluded, however, that the application of the CCTA to Defendants does not infringe on the rights reserved in the Treaty at Point Elliott because the state taxes and the CCTA are not a restriction on their tobacco trade. The district court primarily relied on our decision in Baker. Baker involved the question of whether the Medicine Creek Treaty of 1854 made the CCTA inapplicable to the Puyallup Tribe. Baker, 63 F.3d at 1485. The Medicine Creek Treaty was nearly identical to the Treaty at Point Elliott in relevant respects. The only restriction on trade provided: The said tribes and bands finally agree not to trade at Vancouver's Island, or elsewhere out of the dominions of the United States. Id. We assumed in Baker that the parties to the Medicine Creek Treaty intended no other restrictions on Indian trade. We concluded, however, that the CCTA is not an impermissible restriction on a trading right guaranteed by the Treaty. Id. We held that the CCTA does not restrict trading in cigarettes; it makes it a crime to fail to pay applicable state taxes on cigarettes subject to tax. Id. Defendants argue, correctly, that we must interpret a treaty right in light of the particular tribe's understanding of that right at the time the treaty was made. Smiskin, 487 F.3d at 1267. However, in this case the district court's conclusion that the Swinomish would not have intended to submit to be restricted in their trade in tobacco is nearly identical to our assumption in Baker that the Puyallup intended no . . . restriction on Indian trade other than their agreement not to trade at Vancouver's Island. In Baker, we held that criminalizing the fail[ure] to pay applicable state taxes on cigarettes subject to tax does not restrict trading in cigarettes. This holding applies as much to the Swinomish as it applied to the Puyallup, for Defendants have suggested no reason that the tax on cigarettes is a greater restriction on the Swinomish than it was on the Puyallup. Defendants also note that in Smiskin we distinguished Baker, holding that the pre-notification requirement for the transport of unstamped cigarettes violated the Yakama Treaty of 1855. Smiskin, 487 F.3d at 1267-68. We conclude that Defendants' case is much closer to Baker than to Smiskin. In Smiskin, the Yakama Treaty provided that the Yakamas had the right, in common with citizens of the United States, to travel upon all public highways. Id. at 1262 n. 1. In a previous opinion, we had held that the Yakama Treaty prohibited the state from issuing citations to Yakama truck drivers employed by Yakama logging companies. Cree v. Flores, 157 F.3d 762 (9th Cir.1998). Cree found that travel was of great importance to the Yakamas, that they enjoyed free access to travel routes for trade and other purposes at Treaty time, and that they understood the Treaty to grant them valuable rights that would permit them to continue in their ways. Smiskin, 487 F.3d at 1265 (quoting Cree, 157 F.3d at 769). We therefore concluded that the Treaty must be interpreted to guarantee the Yakamas the right to transport goods to market over public highways without payment of fees for that use. Id. (quoting Cree, 157 F.3d at 769). In Smiskin, we extended that holding to the pre-notification requirement. We distinguished Baker because the Medicine Creek Treaty did not expressly grant any right to the Puyallup Tribe, and noted that the ambiguous treaty language stands in stark contrast to the text of the Yakama Treaty. Id. at 1267. Because of the similarity of the Treaty at Point Elliott at issue in this case to the Medicine Creek Treaty at issue in Baker, and because Defendants have given no reason why the tax is a greater restriction on the Swinomish than it was on the Puyallup, we reject Defendants' treaty argument.
Defendants also argue that the state of Washington lacks jurisdiction to enforce [state cigarette taxes] against reservation Indian[s]. We disagree. As a matter of federal law, the Supreme Court held in Colville that the State may validly require the tribal smokeshops to affix tax stamps purchased from the State to individual packages of cigarettes prior to the time of sale to nonmembers of the Tribe. 447 U.S. at 159, 100 S.Ct. 2069. Defendants suggest that Washington state law somehow deprives Washington of the authority to apply its cigarette taxes to Indian sales to non-Indians. As the district court noted, however, the very state cases cited by Defendants explicitly recognize and endorse Colville, and recognize state authority to tax on-reservation sales of cigarettes to non-Indians. See Bercier v. Kiga, 127 Wash.App. 809, 103 P.3d 232, 237 (2004) ( Colville . . . allows state taxation of non-Indians and nonmember Indians on reservations where tribal members are exempt from taxation.); Matheson v. Washington State Liquor Control Bd., 132 Wash.App. 280, 130 P.3d 897, 900 (2006) ([N]on-Indians and non-tribal Indians, those not enrolled with the tribe where they are doing business, must pay tax on cigarette retail sales on reservations.). We recently affirmed the continuing validity of Colville in Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Indian Nation v. Gregoire, 658 F.3d 1078 (9th Cir.2011).