Court Opinion

ID: 9719176
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:44:58.368137+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:04.941120
License: Public Domain

LEVINE, Justice,
concurring in result.
I join only in that portion of the majority opinion that holds that Otter Tail Power *108Company has no standing to assert the jurisdictional question. As to the rest of the opinion, I observe that although the majority has ranged far and wide in answering broad questions about the authority of the Tribe to regulate electric service to the Reservation, the regulatory issue that would be before us if the Tribe were, is a much narrower one than the majority opinion recognizes. The question to be answered would be only: May the Tribe regulate a non-member utility which furnishes electrical power to a business within the Reservation belonging to the Tribe and located on land owned by the Tribe? Under Montana v. United States, 450 U.S. 544, 101 S.Ct. 1245, 67 L.Ed.2d 493 (1981), I believe the answer is “yes.”
In Montana, the Supreme Court agreed with the Court of Appeals that the Tribe could regulate hunting or fishing by nonmembers on land belonging to the Tribe or held by the United States in trust for the Tribe. That parallels the situation here where the land involved belongs to tribe members. Nor was there any question raised in the Brendale case [Brendale v. Confederated Tribes & Bands of Yakima Indian Nation, — U.S. -, 109 S.Ct. 2994, 106 L.Ed.2d 343 (1989)], that the Tribe had exclusive jurisdiction to zone land owned by members of the Tribe and located within the Reservation.
I note also that neither side to this dispute offered arguments based on state law. See, e.g., ch. 54-40.2, NDCC.
I am uneasy and concerned that in deciding so many issues, we have jumped the gun without the benefit of the input of the Tribe and its presentation of the tribal interests at stake. Even if the majority’s conclusion that the Tribe has no inherent sovereign authority to regulate Otter Tail in this case is correct, it is impetuous to decide, as the majority does, that PSC regulation does not threaten or have some direct effect on the political integrity, the economic security, or the health or welfare of the Tribe. We should wait to hear from the Tribe before we denigrate its interests. Indeed, in Brendale, the trial court made specific findings that the county’s exercise of zoning power would have no direct effect on the tribe and would not threaten the tribe’s political integrity, economic security or health and welfare. Here, the PSC made no comparable findings. Nor could it have, without any evidence on these critical issues of fact from the Tribe or from anyone else.