Court Opinion

ID: 9535025
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:44:45.509649+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:09.545974
License: Public Domain

*525Rosellini, J.
(dissenting) — The majority holds that the on-reservation, nontreaty fishing rights of the Chehalis Indian Tribe are not subject to a treaty allocation closure order which prohibits all persons from taking steelhead trout with gillnets and seine gear in the Chehalis River system. The majority bases its decision on a distinction it conceives between allocation and conservation measures.
The United States Supreme Court has held that state conservation closures operate against Indians, treaty or nontreaty, as well as non-Indians. Antoine v. Washington, 420 U.S. 194, 207, 43 L. Ed. 2d 129, 95 S. Ct. 944 (1975). The Court has also held that treaty Indians have a right to take a "fairly apportioned share" of each run of fish passing through tribal fishing areas, both on and off the reservation. Washington v. Washington State Comm'l Passenger Fishing Vessel Ass'n, 443 U.S. 658, 682, 61 L. Ed. 2d 823, 99 S. Ct. 3055, modified on other grounds sub nom. Washington v. United States, 444 U.S. 816 (1979) (Fishing Vessel). This fairly apportioned share is approximately 50 percent of the harvestable fish. Fishing Vessel, at 685.
In an effort to manage the steelhead fishery in accordance with sound conservation techniques and treaty obligations, the Department of Game sets limits on the number of steelhead which may be taken by Indian "treaty fishermen" and by "nontreaty fishermen". See Puget Sound Gillnetters Ass’n v. Moos, 92 Wn.2d 939, 603 P.2d 819 (1979).
Each year the Department determines the total number of steelhead which can be caught by all fishermen, treaty and nontreaty, and yet allow a sufficient number of fish to return upstream to spawn. By various means, the Department determines the number of fish caught by treaty and nontreaty fishermen during the open season. Once it is determined that a group has caught its 50 percent share, the river is then closed to further fishing by that group.
In these efforts to manage steelhead runs, the Department of Game issues two types of closure orders. Through "allocation closures", the Department stops the taking of *526fish by either treaty fishermen or nontreaty fishermen to prohibit one group or the other from taking more than their 50 percent share. A "conservation closure" stops all fishing by both groups to allow the necessary number of fish to return upstream to spawn.
On January 13, 1981, the Department of Game issued a closure order which provides in relevant part:
WAC 232-32-130 Closure of Nisqually and Chehalis River systems ... to the taking of steelhead trout with gill nets and seines by treaty Indians.
Data gathered by the Department of Game . . . indicates that the treaty share of harvestable steelhead has been reached or will have been reached on the effective date of this order. Therefore, a closure of Nisqually and Chehalis river systems ... is necessary to assure non-treaty sports fishermen their right to take their share of those remaining steelhead.
[The following] rule is therefore adopted as an emergency^]
It shall be unlawful for all persons to take, fish for, or possess steelhead trout with gill nets and seine gear in the . . . Chehalis River system . . . effective 6:00 p.m., January 14, 1981.
(Italics mine.) Director's Order 121, Dep't of Game (1981).
The "Chehalis River system" referred to in this order runs through the Chehalis Indian Reservation. The majority holds that this closure, being in the form of a treaty allocation measure, is inapplicable to the nontreaty Cheha-lis Indian Tribe. This distinction is inappropriate. The overall management technique is to assure the perpetuation of the steelhead run for both treaty and nontreaty fishermen. This treaty fishing closure not only assures a catch for nontreaty fishermen but assures the perpetuation of the run by prohibiting the use of gillnets and seine gear on the Chehalis River system.
The Chehalis Indian Tribe has rights no different than other fishermen when the purpose of a closure is to effectu*527ate treaty obligations and to assure conservation of the species.
This is such a case and I would affirm the convictions.
Reconsideration denied November 15, 1984.