Lac du Flambeau Band

From Chicago Tribune:

MADISON, Wis. – U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb, whose rulings helped clear the way for the resumption of Chippewa off-reservation treaty rights in northern Wisconsin, announced Thursday she is retiring.

Crabb, appointed in 1979 by President Jimmy Carter, said she will retire to senior status, allowing her to continue to hear some cases and clearing the way for President Barack Obama to appoint a replacement.

Crabb, 69, said the move provides a way to tackle the court’s increasing caseload without asking Congress to create a third judgeship.

“Given the nation’s current economic straits and the immediate needs of this court, I have decided after considerable reflection that this is the best course for all concerned,” Crabb said in a statement.

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From the Wisconsin State Journal:

Northern Wisconsin marks an anniversary this year, but not everyone is celebrating. It involves 19th century Indian treaties that brought walleyes, fork-like spears, rock-throwing protesters and claims of racism to the forefront.

Twenty-five years ago, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago affirmed that Chippewa Indian tribes retained off-reservation fishing and hunting rights in 1837 and 1842 treaties that ceded millions of acres of what is now the northern third of Wisconsin to the U.S. government.

It led to a revival of an ancient Chippewa practice — spearing spawning walleyes from lakes in the spring — and led to fears from hook-and-line anglers that the fisheries would be ruined by a fishing method they claimed wasn’t sporting at all.

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Turtle Talk

Judge Barbara Crabb Takes Senior Status

25th Anniversary of Voigt Decision in Wisconsin