{"id":25354,"date":"2022-06-20T17:18:35","date_gmt":"2022-06-20T21:18:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indianz.com\/News\/?p=25354"},"modified":"2022-06-20T17:18:36","modified_gmt":"2022-06-20T21:18:36","slug":"scotusblog-supreme-court-delivers-rebuke-to-state-in-indian-gaming-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2022\/06\/20\/scotusblog-supreme-court-delivers-rebuke-to-state-in-indian-gaming-case\/","title":{"rendered":"SCOTUSblog: Supreme Court delivers rebuke to state in Indian gaming case"},"content":{"rendered":" \"U.S.<\/a>
A view of the U.S. Supreme Court. Artwork by Art Lien<\/figcaption>\r\n
Divided court rejects Texas\u2019 bid to control gambling in tribal casinos<\/div>\r\n
Monday, June 20, 2022<\/div>\r\n
By Ronald Mann<\/div>\r\n
SCOTUSblog<\/div>\r\n
scotusblog.com<\/a><\/div>\r\n

<\/P>\r\nLast Wednesday\u2019s decision<\/a> in Ysleta del Sur Pueblo v. Texas<\/em><\/a> resolves a longstanding dispute about the ability of Texas to control gambling on the lands of two of the Native American tribes that reside there. The answer the court gave was a stern rebuke, vitiating the plenary control that lower-court decisions had granted the state for more than a quarter of a century.

<\/P>\r\nThe problem involves the odd history of two of the three Native American tribes that remain in the state of Texas, the petitioner Ysleta del Sur Pueblo (a tiny reservation near El Paso) and the much larger Alabama-Coushatta reservation in East Texas. Although almost all Native American tribes in the United States operate under a trust relationship with the federal government, those two tribes were in a trust relationship with Texas from 1968 to 1987. When Texas authorities decided that their state constitution did not permit that relationship, Congress restored a federal trust relationship for those tribes by passing the Restoration Act<\/a> in 1987. The most controversial provisions of that statute, addressed in Ysleta<\/em>, are the provisions that govern the tribes\u2019 subjection to Texas gambling regulations.

<\/P>\r\nThe basic problem is how to reconcile one provision, which bars gambling activity \u201cprohibited\u201d by Texas law, with another provision, stating that the statute is not \u201ca grant of civil or criminal regulatory jurisdiction to the State of Texas.\u201d The lower courts quickly allowed Texas to act under those provisions to subject tribal operations to the full range of its regulations. In this case, for example, the state successfully challenged the operation of bingo by the Pueblo that does not follow the details of Texas\u2019 regulations on that subject. Justice Neil Gorsuch\u2019s opinion for the court squarely rejects that understanding.

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The days of state governments claiming special authority over Indian Country appear to be numbered, with the nation\u2019s highest court issuing another favorable ruling for tribal interests.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/div>\n\t

\n\t\t\"Indianz.Com\"\t\tIndianz.Com\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\r\n

<\/P>\r\nFor Gorsuch, \u201cthe most striking feature about th[e statutory] language is its dichotomy between prohibition and regulation.\u201d Specifically, as he puts it, the first provision \u201csays that gaming activities prohibited<\/em> by state law are also prohibited as a matter of federal law (using some variation of the word \u2018prohibited\u2019 no fewer than three times).\u201d Conversely, the second provision \u201cinsists that the statute does not grant Texas civil or criminal regulatory<\/em> jurisdiction with respect to \u2026 gaming.\u201d

<\/P>\r\nGorsuch starts with \u201ca careful look at the statute\u2019s terms standing on their own.\u201d Quoting from an assortment of dictionaries, he suggests that \u201cto prohibit<\/em> something means to \u2018forbid,\u2019 prevent,\u2019 or \u2018effectively stop\u2019 it, or \u2018make [it] impossible.\u2019\u201d In contrast, dictionaries that he quotes suggest that \u201cto regulate<\/em> something is usually understood to mean to \u2018fix the time, amount, degree, or rate\u2019 of an activity \u2018according to rule[s].\u2019\u201d

<\/P>\r\nGorsuch sees those definitions as \u201ca problem\u201d for Texas. The dispute in this particular case involves bingo, and Texas \u201cconcedes that its laws do not forbid, prevent, effectively stop, or make bingo impossible.\u201d Bingo in fact is quite common in Texas, \u201csubject to fixed rules about the time, place, and manner in which it may be conducted.\u201d For Gorsuch, \u201cit would seem to follow that Texas\u2019s laws fall on the regulatory rather than prohibitory side of the line \u2013 and thus may not be applied on tribal lands.\u201d

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