Opinion ID: 1466405
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Role of the Dictionary Act in Interpreting Section 81

Text: Contrary to the contention raised by the dissent, nothing in our reading of Section 81 contravenes 1 U.S.C. § 1. [8] More commonly referred to as the Dictionary Act, that statute reads in relevant part: In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, unless the context indicates otherwise . . . . words used in the present tense include the future as well as the present. Focusing upon the phrase words used in the present tense include the future as well as the present, the dissent asserts that the word is as used in Section 81(a) encompasses both lands that are currently held in trust by the United States for an Indian tribe and lands that might eventually be held in similar fashion. But in so doing, the dissent fails to grapple adequately with (1) the Supreme Court's repeated instructions regarding proper statutory construction and (2) the directive in the Dictionary Act itself that compels us to consider first the context of the statute. First, the Supreme Court has not once invoked the Dictionary Act in an effort to convert an unambiguous verb tense into claimed ambiguity, let alone then going on to employ that manufactured ambiguity as a stepping stone to altering the plain sense of a statute. [9] Here is the succinct directive in United States v. Wilson, 503 U.S. 329, 333, 112 S.Ct. 1351, 117 L.Ed.2d 593 (1992) and the cases that it cites: Congress' use of a verb tense is significant in construing statutes. See, e.g., Otte v. United States, 419 U.S. 43, 49-50, 95 S.Ct. 247, 42 L.Ed.2d 212 (1974); Gwaltney of Smithfield, Ltd. v. Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Inc., 484 U.S. 49, 63-64, n. 4, 108 S.Ct. 376, 98 L.Ed.2d 306 (1987). Similarly, Barnhart v. Sigmon Coal Co., 534 U.S. 438, 450, 122 S.Ct. 941, 151 L.Ed.2d 908 (2002) made clear that in all statutory construction cases, we begin with the language of the statute. Inquiries into the meaning of a statute come to an end if the statutory language is unambiguous and the statutory scheme is coherent and consistent ( id., quoting Robinson v. Shell Oil Co., 519 U.S. 337, 340, 117 S.Ct. 843, 136 L.Ed.2d 808 (1997)(internal quotation marks omitted)). Given the specific and unambiguous manner in which Section 81(a) defines the term Indian lands, it is not apparent why the Dictionary Act must even be consulted. Second, even on its own terms the Dictionary Act supports the analysis here: It looks first to context, and only if the context leaves the meaning open to interpretation does the default provision come into play. As defined by Rowland, 506 U.S. at 199-200, 113 S.Ct. 716 (alterations in original, emphasis added): Context here means the text of the Act of Congress surrounding the word at issue, or the texts of other related congressional Acts, and this is simply an instance of the word's ordinary meaning: [t]he part or parts of a discourse preceding or following a `text' or passage or a word, or so intimately associated with it as to throw light upon its meaning. Webster's New International Dictionary 576 (2d ed.1942). While context can carry a secondary meaning of [a]ssociated surroundings, whether material or mental, ibid., we doubt that the broader sense applies here. And Rowland, id. at 199 went on to explain that the word indicates broadens the scope of the inquiry that a court must make ( id. at 200, 113 S.Ct. 716): If context thus has a narrow compass, the indication contemplated by 1 U.S.C. § 1 has a broader one. The Dictionary Act's very reference to contextual indication bespeaks something more than an express contrary definition, and courts would hardly need direction where Congress had thought to include an express, specialized definition for the purpose of a particular Act; ordinary rules of statutory construction would prefer the specific definition over the Dictionary Act's general one. Where a court needs help is in the awkward case where Congress provides no particular definition, but the definition in 1 U.S.C. § 1 seems not to fit.[ [10] ] There it is that the qualification unless the context indicates otherwise has a real job to do, in excusing the court from forcing a square peg into a round hole. With that guidance in mind, we consider a series of congressional acts related to Section 81specifically, Sections 465, 2719 and 271that clearly avoid an awkward rendering of Section 81. Sections 465 and 2719 are particularly instructive, for they respond directly to the dissent's concern that construing Section 81 so that it applies only to contracts involving lands already in trust would allow parties to evade federal review entirely. Manipulative parties, the dissent fears, could take advantage of such an interpretation by carefully orchestrating the timing of any agreement so that any provision encumbering Indian lands would be executed only before placing land in trust. But such fears are more than adequately assuaged by the existence of Sections 465 and 2719, both of which guarantee that a contract such as the one that NGV and the Tribe had entered into can never escape the federal government's attention. First, Section 465 (already quoted in n. 4) and its implementing regulations set forth an extensive review process that the Secretary of the Interior must undertake before taking lands into trust (see, e.g., 25 C.F.R. §§ 151.3, 151.11(c); Larry E. Scrivner, Acquiring Land into Trust for Indian Tribes, 37 NEW ENG.L. REV. 603, 606-07 (2003)(Scrivner), [11] describing the trust application process and the Secretary's duty to investigate, among other things, the purpose for which the land will be used and the effect that placing the land into trust will have on the tax bases of local government; Mary Jane Sheppard, Taking Indian Land Into Trust, 44 S.D. L. REV. 681, 687-88 (1998-99) (Sheppard), [12] similarly describing the comprehensive nature of a Section 465 review). During such a review a tribe is first required to address, among other issues, its need for the land, the purpose for which the land will be used, the effect that taking the land into trust would have on state and local political subdivisions and whether a decision to take the land into trust would comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (see Scrivner, 37 NEW ENG.L. REV. at 606). With that initial information in hand, the Department of the Interior then gives state and local governments the opportunity to object to the tribe's application through evidentiary documentation demonstrating why taking the land into trust would impact[ ] their jurisdiction or their tax base ( id. at 607). Only after all sides have provided their input does the Department begin its own independent examination of the trust application, a process that requires a thorough analysis of all the facts and documentation, environmental clearances, archaeological studies, and all of the things that weigh into the action ( id. ). Any final decision is subject both to a similarly extensive administrative appeals process and to a subsequent review in the federal courts ( id. ). And relatedly, in cases where the tribe intends to use lands transferred into trust for gaming purposes, Section 2719(b)(1)(A) requires that the Secretary first determine[ ] that a gaming establishment ... would be in the best interest of the Indian tribe and its members, and would not be detrimental to the surrounding community (see also Sheppard, 44 S.D. L. REV. at 687). In short, any concern that NGV was trying to game the system by executing its contract with the Tribe before transferring land into trust is wholly unfounded. Instead any later effort to take lands into trust triggers an extensive review process by the Secretarya review that is far more meaningful than any Section 81 proceeding that would deal with not-yet-identified lands that might be taken into trust in the future, because a Section 465 proceeding addresses the suitability of a specific parcel of land in all respects, rather than the totally speculative process that is necessarily involved when a presently unknown future acquisition is sought to be made the subject of an attempted analysis. Sections 2710(d)(3)(A) and 2710(d)(7) also help illuminate the meaning of Section 81, particularly because both are part and parcel of IGRA, which defines Indian lands in much the same manner as Section 81 (see Section 2703(4)(B) (emphasis added), defining Indian lands in part as any lands title to which is held in trust by the United States for the benefit of any Indian tribe....). Section 2710(d)(3)(A) provides: Any Indian tribe having jurisdiction over the Indian lands upon which a class III gaming activity is being conducted, or is to be conducted, shall request the State in which such lands are located to enter into negotiations for the purpose of entering into a Tribal-State compact governing the conduct of gaming activities. If any State should fail to enter into such negotiations, Section 2710(d)(7) provides the Indian tribe with a series of remedies, including the right to initiate an action against the State in federal district court. But to bring such an action, as the Sixth Circuit has held in Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians v. Engler, 304 F.3d 616, 618 (6th Cir.2002), the Indian tribe must show that it has Indian lands as defined by IGRA at the time of filing. Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish, id. spelled out the rationale underlying its conclusion in terms that bear considerably on the Section 81 question now before us: Under § 2710(d)(3)(A), it is clear that the State does not have an obligation to negotiate with an Indian tribe until the tribe has Indian lands. The purposes of this requirement appear to be to ensure that the casino will be inside the borders of the State, to give the State notice of where it will be, and to require the tribe to have a place for the casino that has been federally approved. If the Indian tribe does not have any land in the State that can be used for a casino, why should the State waste its time negotiating about such a casino? In the absence of a location, the State would have no way to assess the environmental, safety, traffic, and other problems that such a casino could pose. Accord, Mechoopda Indian Tribe of Chico Rancheria, Cal. v. Schwarzenegger, No. Civ. S-03-2327WBS/GGH, 2004 WL 1103021, at  (E.D.Cal. Mar.12, 2004). Given those practical concerns, it is no wonder that the Bureau's policy has been to review contracts under Section 81 only when they involve lands currently held in trust by the United States. That policy is evinced by the Bureau's own April 13, 2005 letter to the Tribe, which made clear that its conclusion that the NGV-Tribe agreement was invalid for lack of Section 81 approval was predicated on the Tribe's lawyers having alerted the Bureau to its Mendocino County property, not to the possibility of acquiring future trust lands. [13] That same policy is further confirmed through an affidavit included in the record by NGV from Kevin Gover (Gover), a former Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs. Gover attests that during his tenure from late 1997 to early 2001, it was not the [Bureau's] policy or practice to review contracts to determine whether such contracts fall within the scope of 25 U.S.C. § 81(b) ... in the absence of the existence of trust lands. Instead, in cases where the purpose of the contract between a developer and a tribe [was] to assist the tribe in acquiring real property, and petitioning the United States to accept title to such property in trust for the benefit of the tribe, the Bureau's review would be done pursuant to the regulations implementing Section 465. As Gover puts it: [t]he Secretary's acceptance of title to the subject property in trust for the petitioning tribe subsumes all approvals required under Federal law. And as all of that applies to the facts before us, the fact that the Tribe and NGV would eventually have to undergo Section 465 review if their later-acquired lands were to be transferred into trust obviated any need to have their contract approved under Section 81. In conclusion, there is no reason to resort to the Dictionary Act's default rules of statutory interpresentation. Instead the context here clearly indicates that Section 81 is limited only to reviewing those contracts involving presently held trust lands.