Court Opinion

ID: 9434090
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:42:13.236195+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:46.317064
License: Public Domain

Justice Souter,
with whom Justice Kennedy and Justice Thomas join,
concurring.
If we are to see coherence in the various manifestations of the general law of tribal jurisdiction over non-Indians, the source of doctrine must be Montana v. United States, 450 U.S. 544 (1981), and it is in light of that case that I join the Court’s opinion. Under Montana, the status of territory within a reservation’s boundaries as tribal or fee land may have much to do (as it does here) with the likelihood (or not) that facts will exist that are relevant under the exceptions to Montana’s “general proposition” that “the inherent sover*660eign powers of an Indian tribe do not extend to the activities of nonmembers of the tribe.” Id., at 565. That general proposition is, however, the first principle, regardless of whether the land at issue is fee land, or land owned by or held in trust for an Indian tribe.