federal trust relationship

Cert Petition in Trust Accounting Claim for Sand Creek Descendants

Sarah M Donnelly1 Comment

Download petition for a Writ of Certiorari here.

Questions presented:

Whether a treaty promise to pay reparations to a group of Native Americans in the form and amount that is “best adapted to the respected wants and conditions of” said group of Native Americans, and subsequent appropriation of funds by Congress to pay such reparations, create a fiduciary relationship between the United States and said group of Native Americans.

Whether the Administrative Procedures Act waives the United States’ immunity from suit for accounting claims regarding trust mismanagement that begun before the enactment of the Act.

Whether a set of Appropriations Acts by Congress that defer the accrual of trust mismanagement claims against the United States operates as a waiver of the United States’ immunity from suit.

Previous posts in re Flute v. U.S. here.

New Scholarship by Mary Wood: “Tribal Trustees in Climate Crisis”

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Mary C. Wood has posted “Tribal Trustees in Climate Crisis” on SSRN. It is forthcoming in the American Indian Law Journal. Here is the abstract:

The legal “cornerstone” of federal Indian law is the federal trust obligation. The duty was formulated by courts long ago to protect native nations against federal actions that harm the retained tribal property and resources. Yet in recent years, courts have diminished the force of the doctrine by equating it, for all practical purposes, with statutory standards. This essay turns attention to another doctrine, the public trust doctrine, which characterizes sovereigns as trustees of their resources. The public trust framework positions tribes as co-trustees with states and the federal government. This article suggests a role for tribes in climate crisis by asserting the right of co-trustees and co-tenants to prevent waste of the common resource – the atmosphere.

New Scholarship on Fracking Near Indian Country

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Heather Williams and Hillary M. Hoffman have posted “Fracking Near Indian Country: The Federal Trust Relationship, Tribal Sovereignty, and the Right to Clean Water,” forthcoming in the Wyoming Law Review, on SSRN.

Here is the abstract:

The tortured history of the federal and state governments’ relationships with Native American tribes has created a legal structure in which Native American people are, quite frequently, the recipients of non-native waste generated off of native lands. Traditionally, this has taken the form of solid waste, but in recent years, it has grown to include nuclear waste and wastewater generated by hydraulic fracturing, otherwise known as “flowback fluids”, or “produced water.”

Over the last two years, produced water from four different hydraulic fracturing operations was found being discharged onto dry land and into “streambeds covered in white crystals,” on the Wind River Reservation in central Wyoming. In addition to the open dumping of these fluids, there was also visible oil and foam sheen. Pollution events like these are the result of a regulatory exemption under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (“RCRA”), commonly referred to as the “livestock loophole.” The livestock loophole, created in 1979, allows oil and gas operations to discharge hazardous waste fluids generated from fracking operations onto reservation land if they are consumed by livestock and wildlife, or used for agricultural purposes. The EPA, which regulates RCRA and has a fiduciary responsibility toward Indian Tribes, has not set maximum levels for many compounds used in the drilling process, and uses antiquated data to regulate toxics that have been capped. Further, industrial “trade secrets” prohibit the disclosure of additional toxics in drilling fluids under intellectual property laws, making it impossible to regulate pollution limits for surface waters under the Clean Water Act’s National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES).

The policy behind the livestock loophole is complex. Reports of gushing streams of toxic fracking fluids on reservation land reek of environmental injustice, yet tribes, as sovereign governments, are willing, able, and informed participants in the solicitation, installation, and placement of non-native waste on their own tribal lands.

Several questions arise out of the issues faced by the Wind River tribes: Is the federal policy to dump fracking fluids in Indian country consistent with its federal trust obligation, and its requirement under RCRA to protect human health and safety from toxic compounds? Is the livestock loophole’s policy to feed fracking fluids to livestock, wildlife, and agriculture a legitimate beneficial use under the Prior Appropriation doctrine? Should the EPA be forced to conduct up-to-date studies on the compounds in produced water, and their effects on living organisms, including humans? This Article will answer those questions and explore the bounds of tribal sovereignty and the federal trust responsibility in the context of produced water from fracking operations.