Court Opinion

ID: 9539284
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:01:36.313953+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:58:40.874337
License: Public Domain

ZIMMERMAN, Justice:
(dissenting).
I dissent. I cannot join the majority in interpreting a federal statute that affects the boundaries of the Uintah-Ouray Indian Reservation in a way which contradicts the construction approved by a majority of the entire United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. I find almost incredible *954the refusal of the majority of this court to accord comity to a federal court’s decision in an area in which the federal government has preeminent authority and a unique trust responsibility. A majority of this court has given the State of Utah what it has desperately sought for six years — a second shot at persuading the United States Supreme Court to reject the Tenth Circuit’s ruling and to give Utah control over a large part of the original reservation. This litigation certainly will not end here, now that there is a square conflict between the entire Tenth Circuit and.this court. But this tactical victory for the State comes at an unacceptably high cost to the relationship between the state and federal judiciaries. Moreover, on the merits, I think the majority reaches the wrong result.
This case arises in the context of Clinton Perank’s appeal challenging Utah’s assertion of criminal jurisdiction over him. The State has taken advantage of Perank’s appeal from a relatively minor criminal conviction to relitigate the question of the Uin-tah-Ouray Indian Reservation boundaries. In a separate federal proceeding seven years ago, the Tenth Circuit decided these' boundaries against the State. Ute Indian Tribe v. Utah, 773 F.2d 1087 (10th Cir.1985) (en banc), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 994, 107 S.Ct. 596, 93 L.Ed.2d 596 (1986). Now, the State seeks to reopen the boundary issue in a new forum.
I would object to the State’s opportunistic misuse of Perank’s petty criminal prosecution to readjudicate a settled issue under any circumstance, but the unequal and inadequate briefing of the boundary issue in this ease makes it a particularly poor vehicle for bringing us into a direct confrontation with the Tenth Circuit. Perank’s brief contained a total of six pages of argument, the bulk of it concerning his assertion that he is an Indian. He allotted fewer than two pages to jurisdictional and boundary issues. In contrast, the State filed a fifty-page brief, devoting the majority of it to an attack on the Tenth Circuit’s decision in Ute Indian Tribe and to a reargument of the boundary issue. In addition to the disparate treatment of the boundary issue by the immediate parties, Uintah and Du-chesne Counties, which were also parties to the Tenth Circuit action, lodged a seventeen-page amicus brief supporting the State’s position. Recognizing the one-sid-edness of the proceeding, the State’s counsel acknowledged at oral argument that perhaps the State’s real adversary in this case — the Tenth Circuit — was absent.
We made an attempt to cure the one-sidedness of the briefing by soliciting participation by other parties with interests in this case. Unfortunately, we met with little success. At our invitation, the Ute Indian Tribe filed an amicus brief. However, apparently believing that we would not consider overturning the result of the Tenth Circuit’s en banc decision, the Tribe, rather than addressing the impact of the Tenth Circuit’s decision on our consideration of the issue or the merits of the boundary dispute, argued only that Perank was not a member of the Tribe and was therefore not in a position to challenge the state court’s jurisdiction over him.
The week before argument, we contacted the State and encouraged it to inform the United States Attorney of the upcoming argument and to inquire whether the Justice Department wished to present its position before this court. The Justice Department did not appear at argument. We then invited the Justice Department to brief its position as an amicus. However, the Justice Department, demonstrating a surprising lack of interest in the case, refused to brief the matter and submitted only the brief it had filed years earlier in opposition to the State’s petition for a writ of certiorari to the Tenth Circuit in Ute Indian Tribe. Thus, the State’s arguments on the boundary question were virtually unchallenged.
Notwithstanding the lack of a true adversary proceeding on the boundary issue, the majority eagerly proceeds to the merits of the boundary dispute and takes a position contrary to that of a majority of the entire Tenth Circuit. I would find a direct confrontation with the Tenth Circuit on an essentially federal issue something to be *955avoided under any circumstances, but this court’s rush to adjudicate the issue is especially egregious given the importance of this question and the fact that the interests of all parties affected in the proceeding are not fairly before this court.
The reason I would not reach the merits of the boundary issue can be summed up in one word: comity. Under the doctrine of comity, courts of one jurisdiction will give effect to the laws and judicial decisions of another out of deference and mutual respect. See, e.g., Pan Energy v. Martin, 813 P.2d 1142, 1146 (Utah 1991); Tracy v. Superior Court, 168 Ariz. 23, 810 P.2d 1030, 1041 (1991); Perrenoud v. Perrenoud, 206 Kan. 559, 480 P.2d 749, 760 (1971); In re Custody of Sengstock, 165 Wis.2d 86, 477 N.W.2d 310, 314 (Wis.Ct.App.1991). See generally 21 C.J.S. Courts § 210 (1990). The scope and applicability of the comity doctrine are committed to the sound discretion of each court. See, e.g., Pan Energy, 813 P.2d at 1146; State ex rel. Speer v. Haynes, 392 So.2d 1183, 1185 (Ala.Civ.Ct.App.1979), rev’d on other grounds sub nom. Ex Parte Haynes, 392 So.2d 1187 (Ala.1980); Tracy, 810 P.2d at 1041; Philadelphia v. Austin, 86 N.J. 55, 429 A.2d 568, 572 (1981); Sheridan v. Sheridan, 65 Wis.2d 504, 223 N.W.2d 557, 560 (Wis.1974). The instant case presents compelling reasons to follow the rules of comity and defer to the Tenth Circuit’s resolution of the boundary issue.
As a general proposition, we should defer to decisions of coordinate courts that have resolved the precise issue we face, unless doing so would contravene the laws or policy of this state. See, e.g., Philadelphia, 429 A.2d at 572; In re Custody of Sengstock, 477 N.W.2d at 314. Although we have an interest in determining the scope of our own jurisdiction, I know of no existing state law or policy that would preclude us from deferring to the Tenth Circuit’s determination of the boundaries of the Uintah-Ouray Indian Reservation.1 For example, if we were to defer to the Tenth Circuit’s decision, the result would not leave a jurisdictional void resulting in wrongs to this state or its citizens that would go uncompensated or unpunished. The Ute Indian Law and Order Code provides the courts of the Ute Indian Tribe with jurisdiction over civil and criminal matters occurring on the reservation and recognizes the jurisdiction of other forums where the Tribe does not have jurisdiction. See The Law and Order Code of the Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation, Utah § 1-2-5. And we have spoken before of the need to recognize Indian tribes as sovereigns that are entitled to a presumption of legitimacy insofar as the exercise of their judicial power is concerned. See In re Adoption of Halloway, 732 P.2d 962, 968 (Utah 1986); cf. Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians v. Holyfield, 490 U.S. 30, 48-49, 109 S.Ct. 1597, —, 104 L.Ed.2d 29 (1989) (approving Holloway).
But even if there were some presumption that we should reexamine a federal court determination of the jurisdiction of Utah courts — a proposition neither the State nor the majority advances — the circumstances of this case are more than sufficient to show that such a redetermination is inappropriate. First, comity concerns are heightened here where we are asked to revisit issues of federal law, decided on defensible bases by coordinate federal courts,2 for the sole purpose of creating a *956conflict with the federal courts to force Supreme Court review. “Comity between federal and state courts is necessary to prevent scandal from unseemly conflicts of jurisdiction and to promote a decent and orderly administration of justice.” 21 C.J.S. Courts § 210 (1990). Instead of seeking to further the interests of comity— prevention of a direct jurisdictional clash and promotion of the uniform administration of justice — the majority’s decision to reach and redecide the merits of the boundary question needlessly upsets a previously settled area of law and achieves the opposite effect. Today’s decision encourages litigants to forum shop in the hope of inconsistent decisions, an ill comity seeks to avoid in the federal-state context.3 See Dewey v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 121 N.J. 69, 577 A.2d 1239, 1244 (1990).
An additional reason for applying principles of comity is to recognize the unique role of federal law in regulating Indian lands and interests. Because of this unique role, “federal courts are the ultimate decision maker as to whether federal, state or tribal courts have jurisdiction in a particular Indian law case.” State v. Daly, 454 N.W.2d 342, 344 (S.D.1990). The primacy of federal authority in this area stems from at least three sources: the Constitution, the federal statute that admitted Utah to the Union, and the special relationship assumed by the federal government toward Indian tribes.
The Constitution makes the federal government supreme in dealings with Indian tribes. See Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. (6 Pet.) 515, 561, 8 L.Ed. 483 (1832). Section 8 of Article I gives the federal government power “[t]o regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.”4 U.S. Const, art. I, § 8, cl. 3. This provision implicitly recognizes that Indian tribes are quasi-sovereign entities with sui generis status as “domestic dependent nations” under federal law. Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, 30 U.S. (5 Pet.) 1, 16-17, 8 L.Ed. 25 (1831). As an aspect of their inherent sovereignty, tribes exercise powers of self-government. United States v. Wheeler, 435 U.S. 313, 322-23, 98 S.Ct. 1079, 1085-1086, 55 L.Ed.2d 303 (1978). In line with this grant of authority to the national government, state interference in the government-to-government relationship existing between the United States and Indian tribes is generally prohibited except to the extent that Congress has granted the state such authority. See Worcester, 31 U.S. (6 Pet.) at 561-62; Felix S. Cohen, Handbook of Federal Indian Law 259 (1982) [hereinafter Cohen].5 This “ ‘policy of leaving In*957dians free from state jurisdiction and control is deeply rooted in the Nation’s history.’ ” McClanahan v. Arizona State Tax Comm’n, 411 U.S. 164, 168, 93 S.Ct. 1257, 1260, 36 L.Ed.2d 129 (1973) (quoting Rice v. Olson, 324 U.S. 786, 789, 65 S.Ct. 989, 991, 89 L.Ed. 1367 (1945)). Recognition of this policy was a condition of Utah’s admission to the Union. The Enabling Act states:
[T]he people inhabiting said proposed State do agree that they forever disclaim all right and title ... to all lands lying within said limits owned or held by any Indian or Indian tribes; and that until the title thereto shall have been extinguished by the United States, the same shall be and remain subject to the disposition of the United States, and said Indian lands shall remain under the absolute jurisdiction and control of the Congress of the United States....
Enabling Act, Act of July 16, 1894, ch. 138, § 3, 28 Stat. 107. I recognize that we have concurrent authority with federal courts to construe federal statutes. However, the constitutional commitment of authority over Indian tribes to the federal government requires that we proceed with special care in cases affecting the tribes. And when a federal court has spoken directly on an issue of Indian law, this care should be transformed to an extreme reluctance to redecide the matter.
The federal government’s trust responsibility to Indian tribes also bears on the question of whether we should honor comity principles in this case. Ever since Chief Justice Marshall described the relationship of the tribes to the United States as “that of a ward to his guardian,” Cherokee Nation, 30 U.S. (5 Pet.) at 16, the trust relationship has been a cornerstone of federal Indian jurisprudence. Cohen at 221. Of similar importance is the well-recognized federal policy of supporting tribal self-government and self-determination. See National Farmers Union Ins. Cos. v. Crow Tribe of Indians, 471 U.S. 845, 856, 105 S.Ct. 2447, 2453, 85 L.Ed.2d 818 (1985); Cohen at 349. The federal government’s trust responsibility to the tribes and the federal policy supporting tribal self-government and self-determination provide a backdrop against which federal courts resolve Indian issues. See White Mountain Apache Tribe v. Bracker, 448 U.S. 136, 143, 100 S.Ct. 2578, 2583, 65 L.Ed.2d 665 (1980). And it is this perspective that underlies the rule that courts are to interpret statutory provisions affecting Indians in favor of the tribes. Rosebud Sioux Tribe v. Kneip, 430 U.S. 584, 587, 97 S.Ct. 1361, 1363, 51 L.Ed.2d 660 (1977); Carpenter v. Shaw, 280 U.S. 363, 367, 50 S.Ct. 121, 122, 74 L.Ed. 478 (1930); Ute Indian Tribe, 773 F.2d at 1089.6
Based on the foregoing considerations, I conclude that comity principles require deference to the Tenth Circuit’s disposition of the boundary issue.
Following the course I suggest would not be novel. Several state courts have relied on comity principles in deferring to federal court decisions on Indian law questions. See, e.g., Daly, 454 N.W.2d at 344; State v. St. Francis, 151 Vt. 384, 563 A.2d 249, 253 (1989). Indeed, the South Dakota Supreme Court has gone so far as to overrule one of its cases in recognition of a federal court of appeals' ruling concerning South Dakota’s jurisdiction over Indians living within the state. State v. Spotted Horse, 462 N.W.2d 463, 467 (S.D.1990), cert. denied, — U.S. —, 111 S.Ct. 2041, 114 L.Ed.2d 125 (1991). Similarly, the Oregon Court of Appeals has overruled one of its prior decisions in order to defer to a federal court of appeals’ ruling regarding a *958tribe’s treaty right to fish. State v. Goodell, 84 Or.App. 398, 734 P.2d 10, 11-12, rev. denied, 303 Or. 455, 737 P.2d 1248 (1987). Although these two courts did not expressly rely on comity principles in their holdings, I see no other obvious bases for the results they reached.
In short, there is well-established precedent for following comity principles in cases such as this.
As a final matter, I register my objection to the majority’s treatment of the merits of the boundary issue. Were I to reach the issue, I would follow the exhaustive and thoroughly researched opinions of the federal courts, both trial and appellate. See Ute Indian Tribe, 773 F.2d 1087; Utah Indian Tribe v. State of Utah, 521 F.Supp. 1072 (D.Utah 1981). They constitute an adequate remonstrance to the majority’s disposition of the issue. Specifically, those decisions followed the approach dictated by the Supreme Court in determining whether the various enactments at issue demonstrated a congressional intent to diminish reservation boundaries. That Court has said that, in the absence of “substantial and compelling evidence of a congressional intention to diminish Indian lands,” the courts’ “traditional solicitude for the Indian tribes” must compel a finding that “the old reservation boundaries survived the opening.” Solem v. Bartlett, 465 U.S. 463, 472, 104 S.Ct. 1161, 1167, 79 L.Ed.2d 443 (1984) (emphasis added) (quoted in Ute Indian Tribe, 773 F.2d at 1089); accord Rosebud, 430 U.S. at 586, 97 S.Ct. at 1363 (“Doubtful 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.” (Citation omitted)). The Tenth Circuit and the district court viewed the relevant statutes with this perspective, see 773 F.2d at 1089; 521 F.Supp. at 1110 n. 118; a close reading of the majority decision here demonstrates that it does not.
There are times when I, as a state court judge, lament what might be fairly characterized as the second-guessing of our decisions by federal courts simply because they do not like a result we may have reached. See, e.g., Lafferty v. Cook, 949 F.2d 1546 (10th Cir.1991) (disagreeing with State v. Lafferty, 749 P.2d 1239 (Utah 1988)) cert. denied sub nom. Cook v. Lafferty, — U.S. —, 112 S.Ct. 1942, 118 L.Ed.2d 548 (1992). The present case puts that shoe on the other foot, an exercise that may be ironic, but is even less defensible. The federal government is, after all, supreme on questions that fall within its purview. In this situation, federal statutory law is at issue, the federal trust responsibility to the Indian tribe is at issue, and it was the federal courts that adjudicated the boundary question years ago. As of today, federal supremacy and Supreme Court review of this court’s decision provides the only remaining hope for the Ute Tribe, one of those “weak and defenseless people who are the wards of the nation, [and who are] dependent upon its protection and good faith,” Rosebud, 430 U.S. at 586, 97 S.Ct. at 1363, for what little is left of the patrimony they held before the whites came to this continent.

. In footnote two of the court’s opinion, the majority states that the Justice Department "failed to recognize that the Tenth Circuit’s en banc decision in Ute Indian Tribe was in conflict with prior decisions of this [c]ourt.” The majority then cites Sowards v. Meagher, 37 Utah 212, 108 P. 1112 (1910), and White Rocks Irrigation Co. v. Mooseman, 45 Utah 79, 141 P. 459 (1914). Yet as the majority itself recognizes, "it cannot be said, as a technical matter, that the Sowards opinion specifically addressed the question of whether the Reservation was disestablished as to the lands that were returned to the public domain.” The same observation holds true for White Rocks Irrigation Co. Consequently, the implication of the majority opinion in footnote two — that this court has previously ruled on the issue at bar and that the majority opinion is, in part, following established precedent — is simply incorrect.

. See, e.g., Hall v. Nomura Securities Int'l, 219 Cal.App.3d 43, 268 Cal.Rptr. 45, 49 (Ct.App.), reh'g denied (June 20, 1990); Bouwman v. Department of Social Servs., 144 Mich.App. 744, *956375 N.W.2d 806, 808 (1985); Dewey v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., 121 N.J. 69, 577 A.2d 1239, 1244 (1990); Van De Hey v. United States Nat’l Bank of Oregon, 102 Or.App. 203, 793 P.2d 1388, 1390 (1990), aff’d, 313 Or. 86, 829 P.2d 695 (1992); State v. Goodell, 84 Or.App. 398, 734 P.2d 10, 11-12, rev. denied, 303 Or. 455, 737 P.2d 1248 (1987). See generally Note, Authority in State Courts of Lower Federal Court Decisions on National Law, 48 Colum.L.Rev. 943 (1948); Annotation, Duty of State Courts to Follow Decisions of Federal Courts, Other Than the Supreme Court, on Federal Questions, 147 A.L.R. 857 (1943).

.The application of comity principles in the federal-state context is not new to this state. On at least one occasion of which I am aware, this court has recognized the appropriateness of deferring to federal court interpretations of federal law. See Kuchenmeister v. Los Angeles & S.L.R.R., 52 Utah 116, 122, 172 P. 725, 727 (1918); cf. Antilion v. Department of Employment Sec., 688 P.2d 455, 457 (Utah 1984) (holding that state court must follow federal court decision construing analogous statute from another state where statutes were enacted as condition of continued federal approval of state unemployment compensation programs).

. The Treaty Clause, U.S. Const, art. II, § 2, and the Supremacy Clause, id. art. VI, cl. 2, are also often cited as sources of exclusive federal power in dealing with Indian tribes. See Felix S. Cohen, Handbook of Federal Indian Law 207-12 (1982).

. I recognize that the United States Supreme Court’s "more recent cases have recognized the rights of states, absent a congressional prohibition, to exercise criminal (and, implicitly, civil) jurisdiction over non-Indians located on reservation lands_” County of Yakima v. Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakima Indian Nation, — U.S. —, —, 112 S.Ct. 683, —, 116 L.Ed.2d 687, 697 (1992). However, absent congressional authorization, such state jurisdiction is clearly prohibited to the extent that it " ‘would interfere with reservation self-government or impair a right granted or reserved [to the tribe] by federal law.’ ” Id. (quoting Orga*957nized Village of Kake v. Egan, 369 U.S. 60, 75, 82 S.Ct. 562, 570, 7 L.Ed.2d 573 (1962)).

. See also National Farmers Union Ins. Cos. v. Crow Tribe of Indians, 471 U.S. 845, 856, 105 S.Ct. 2447, 2453, 85 L.Ed.2d 818 (1985) (holding that policy of supporting tribal self-government and self-determination favors rule that provides tribal courts the first opportunity to evaluate factual and legal bases for jurisdictional chal-Ienges); Nance v. Environmental Protection Agency, 645 F.2d 701, 710-11 (9th Cir.) (noting that “any Federal government action is subject to the United States’ fiduciary responsibilities toward the Indian tribes" (emphasis in original)), cert. denied sub nom. Crow Tribe of Indians v. Environmental Protection Agency, 454 U.S. 1081, 102 S.Ct. 635, 70 L.Ed.2d 615 (1981).