tribal election – Page 9

These appeals concern recent efforts by a group of Native Hawaiians to establish their own government. The plaintiffs are Hawaii residents who challenge that process. They appeal the district court’s order denying their request for a preliminary injunction to stop activities related to the drafting and ratification of self-governance documents. Separately, another group of Hawaii residents appeals the district court’s denial of their motion to intervene in the plaintiffs’ lawsuit. For the reasons that follow, we dismiss the plaintiffs’ appeal of the preliminary injunction order as moot, and we affirm the district court’s denial of the motion to intervene.

Briefs here.

Article, “The Timbisha Decision – A Familiar Story and Dangerous Precedent”

June 7, 2016June 7, 2016Victoria Sweet2 Comments

Christopher Foley, attorney at The Indian Law Resource Center, has published an article criticizing the most recent court decision in the Death Valley Timbisha Shoshone case.

Link to article here

From the article:

The Death Valley Timbisha Shoshone Tribe was dealt another setback last week in its ongoing efforts to preserve its constitutional government in the face of persistent federal interference.

On May 27, 2016, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a disappointing decision in the Tribe’s federal lawsuit asserting that the Interior Department’s installation of a new Timbisha government was illegal. The court did not rule on the claims of the Tribe that the Bureau of Indian Affairs had acted illegally. Instead, the court simply said that the case was moot, that deciding those issues would make no difference. The court erroneously found that a tribal constitution that was purportedly adopted in 2014 should retroactively govern this case, and it decided all this without any factual record and no trial at which to present evidence.

This is a familiar story. The United States government claims to support tribal sovereignty and to respect self-government, but when it wants to overrule or take over a tribe it simply does so. It is rarely stopped or restrained by the courts.

Previous coverage here

Ninth Circuit Holds Timbisha Leadership Dispute Mooted by Adoption of New Constitution

May 27, 2016May 27, 2016Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

Here is the opinion in Timbisha Shoshone Tribe v. Dept. of Interior.

The court’s syllabus:

The panel dismissed, as moot, an appeal from the district court’s dismissal of a case challenging the Department of the Interior’s recognition of the election results for leadership authority over the Timbisha Shoshone Tribe. The panel held that the Tribe’s recent adoption of a new constitution, which overhauled tribal membership requirements, mooted the appeal because there was no chance that a remand to the Bureau of Indian Affairs would make any difference whatsoever in the election results.

Briefs here.