factbound and splitless

“Factbound and Splitless” Talk

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here’s the abstract for my talk tomorrow at U-M Law School, “Factbound and Splitless: The Impact of the Certiorari Process on Federal Indian Law.”

The process by which the Supreme Court reviews petitions for writs of certiorari is intended to parse through the thousands of petitions to pick out the most important cases for the Court to decide. These include cases in which there is a split of authority, cases in which a lower court has committed a gross error, or cases in which there is a critical constitutional issue at stake. Cases in which there is no split, cases that will affect only a few people, cases involving simple error correction, or cases involving an unimportant issue are unlikely to be heard by the Court.

Since the 1980s, more and more Justices have resorted to a pool of law clerks for a write-up of each cert petition that includes a recommendation of whether or not the Court should grant cert using these factors. With the release of Justice Blackmun’s papers, the cert pool petitions from the docket years 1986 to 1993 are available for study. The views of Supreme Court clerks in the cert pool memos are often the only written documentation of the Court’s views of the vast majority of petitions that are denied.

The certiorari process creates a structural barrier to the fair adjudication of federal Indian law cases. Because over 80 percent of Indian law cases arise in three circuits, few circuit splits arise, rendering most petitions “splitless.” Moreover, since Indian law cases are often sui generis, they are labeled “factbound.” Most importantly, Supreme Court clerks do not find Indian law cases to be important in regards to the legal issues in dispute, except when the petitioner is a state or local government opposing a tribal interest such as a tribe or a tribal member.

What this means is that the clerks almost never recommend a grant when the petitioner is an Indian tribe or an Indian because the petition is “splitless,” “factbound,” or just unimportant. Conversely, when a state or local government petitions, the Court grants the petition around 75 percent of the time, regardless of whether any split exists. Perhaps this is part of the explanation for why tribal interests have lost 75 percent of their cases before the Court since 1987.

The classic case is a treaty rights case brought by a tribe. If the tribe loses below, the clerks will never find a split in authority because the treaty is unique, making the case sui generis. And Supreme Court clerks almost never find the petitions of Indians and Indian tribes to be important enough to be certworthy. But if the tribe wins below, the opponents usually are state governments, whose cert petitions are viewed favorably by the clerks.

This paper argues, as have occasional Supreme Court clerks, that the Court should recognize the special relationship that exists between the United States and Indian tribes in the certiorari process. The Court should also recognize the structural inequity of the certiorari process in the context of federal Indian law. Both of these changes could be accomplished through an amendment to Supreme Court Rule 10, which articulates the Court’s factors in considering certiorari petitions. Either the Court should grant more petitions filed by tribal interests or deny more petitions filed by tribal opponents.

Hope you can make it. The talk begins at 12:20 in Room 150 in the law school. Lunch is available. The talk is sponsored by the U-M NALSA and the Michigan Journal of Race & Law.

Tales from the Cert Pool: Circuit Splits and Federal Indian Law

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Most cases now reach the Supreme Court because of circuit splits or splits in authority between federal courts of appeal and state supreme courts, but federal Indian law is an exception. In my study of the digital archive of Justice Blackmun’s cert pool memos from docket years 1986-1993, perhaps a quarter of cases that attracted the Court’s attention (reaching the so-called “discuss list” at conference) did so because there was a split.

One reason for the lack of circuit splits in federal Indian law is geography — well over 80 percent of cert petitions arise out of the Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Circuits (and the states located within those circuits).

Moreover, because the cert petition subject matters are based on treaties or statutes that apply only within a state or a region, there is little likelihood of there ever being a split where the federal circuit and the state supreme court agree. Two examples from my forthcoming paper, “Factbound and Splitless”:

In South Dakota v. Spotted Horse, the Justice Blackmun’s clerk wrote a supplemental memo to the cert pool memo in which she wrote, “As the poolwriter noted, there will never be a split on the question of South Dakota’s jurisdiction over these tribal highways because both CA8 and the S.D. SCt agree that the State is without jurisdiction.” In Tarbell v. United States, a criminal case involving the application of a federal statute that applied to New York Indians, the cert pool memowriter (Mark Snyderman, an O’Connor clerk) noted, “Of course, NY state is probably the only other jurisdiction that would have an opportunity to rule on the issue.”

In one famous instance, the Court granted cert in a case thinking there was a circuit split when there really wasn’t (or more accurately, the split dissolved when the Court decided the case). The cases were Anderson v. Wisconsin Dept. of Revenue and Oklahoma Tax Commission v. Sac and Fox Nation. In Anderson, the WI Supreme Court ruled that Indians living off the rez but working on the rez have to pay state income taxes. In Sac and Fox, the CA10 ruled that Indians living on trust land and working for the tribe on trust land don’t have to pay tax. That’s the split, but the split disappeared when the Court decided that trust land is the same as “Indian Country” — making the factual predicate for the split (the residence of the tribal member: one was off, one was on) disappear.

I go into greater depth in the paper, but the story basically is this. The OTC’s petition in Sac and Fox reached the Court first, but neglected to mention the Wisconsin case. The Wisconsin case reached the cert pool next, alleging the split in authority. The cert pool writer thought the Sac and Fox case was factually messier (because of the trust land question) so recommended the Court grant cert in Anderson. Also, the cert pool memowriter argued that the OTC was a bad litigant for not noting the split in the first place, so recommended that the Court go for the Wisconsin case instead. But Anderson filed indigent, and he shouldn’t have, so the Court had to order him to comply with SCT rules before his appeal would proceed. In the meantime, the Court decided to hear Sac and Fox instead. The Anderson pool memo is here and the Sac and Fox memo is here.

And it’s good thing too. Bill Rice’s mastery of oral argument before the Supreme Court can be heard here (with a little help from Edwin Kneedler).

Had the Court decided Anderson instead, it seems clear to me that it would have ruled against Anderson, who was living off the rez and refusing to pay state income taxes. Who know what would have happened to Sac and Fox Nation?

Talk Announcement: “Factbound and Splitless: The Impact of the Certiorari Process on Federal Indian Law” @ UM Law School

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Your humble blogger will be giving a talk at the University of Michigan Law School (co-sponsored, I understand, by the U-M NALSA and the Michigan Journal of Race & Law) on November 12, 2007 at 12:20 PM in Room 150 of Hutchins Hall.

My talk will be called, “Factbound and Splitless: The Impact of the Certiorari Process on Federal Indian Law.”

Here’s the blurb I gave the students on this talk:

I have reviewed each of the 144 Indian law-related cert petitions filed in the Supreme Court from the 1986 to 1993 Terms. Tribal interests began losing 75 percent of their cases in the Court starting in 1987, a significantly worse win rate than even convicted criminal petitioners. I argue that the critical factors the Court looks for in deciding whether to grant cert — “circuit splits,” cases of national “importance,” and cases that are not “factbound” — create structural (and yet wholly discretionary) barriers to the vindication of tribal interests in Supreme Court adjudication.

If you want to read the documents I’ve read in this study, check out the Digital Archive of the Papers of Harry A. Blackmun. And bring your docket numbers, because that’s how it’s organized.

Cert Petition in Carcieri v. Kempthorne

Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

From Indianz.com:

Rhode Island appeals land-into-trust ruling
Friday, October 19, 2007

The state of Rhode Island is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a land-into-trust case that is being watched by tribes nationwide.

In July, the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Bureau of Indian Affairs can place 31 acres in trust for the Narragansett Tribe. The tribe is like any other tribe and can follow the Indian Reorganization Act, which authorized the land-into-trust process, the court said.

As I will argue in my forthcoming article, “Factbound and Splitless: An Empirical Study of the Impact of the Certiorari Process on Federal Indian Law,” the Supreme Court is unlikely to grant cert. in this case for two important reasons. First, there is no circuit split (“splitless”). What that means is that the federal courts of appeal that have addressed the question of the constitutionality of the fee to trust process (25 U.S.C. § 465) — the 8th Circuit in South Dakota v. Kempthorne, the 10th Circuit in Utah v. Shivwits, and the 11th Circuit in Roberts v. U.S., are examples — have held (just as the 1st Circuit did here) that the statute is constitutional.

Second, this case involves the muddying aspects of the Rhode Island Indian Claims Settlement Act and how it affects the application of § 465, rendering this case a bit messy as a factual matter (“factbound”). If this was a straight-up interpretation of § 465 without the Settlement Act’s application, the Court would be more likely to grant cert (although, without a split, not so much). In short, this case implicates a relatively small number of tribes (those Rhode Island tribes).

Land-into-Trust Decision:
Carcieri v. Kempthorne (July 20, 2007)

Earlier 1st Circuit Decision:
Carcieri v. Norton (February 9, 2005)

Relevant Documents:
Carcieri v. Norton Briefs, Opinions (NARF-NCAI Tribal Supreme Court Project

Relevant Laws:
Rhode Island Indian Claims Settlement Act (US Code)

Relevant Links:
Narragansett Tribe – http://www.narragansett-tribe.org
Tribal Supreme Court Project – http://www.narf.org/sct/index.html