Here is the Seventh Circuit’s opinion in Leonard v. Eastern Illinois University.
Seventh Circuit
Seventh Circuit Holds that OSHA Applies to Menominee Tribal Enterprises
The case is Menominee Tribal Enterprises v. Solis (7th Cir.) (Posner, J.). Here are the materials:
News Coverage of Michigan v. EPA Case in Seventh Circuit
From the Chicago Tribune (via Traverse City):
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. – A federal appeals court has ruled in favor of a Wisconsin-based Indian tribe in a 16-year dispute with the state of Michigan over air quality standards.
Michigan challenged the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency‘s decision in 2008 to grant the Forest County Potawatomi Community’s reservation the highest level of protection allowed under the federal Clean Air Act. EPA’s action followed fruitless negotiations between the tribe and the state dating from the early 1990s.
The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the case Wednesday, saying the state lacked standing to contest the federal agency’s decision.
“This is a great victory,” said Philip Shopodock, chairman of the Potawatomi tribe. “Pure air and pure water are essential to our culture and our beliefs. We must protect our home for future generations.”
Seventh Circuit Holds that Michigan Lacks Standing to Challenge Wisconsin Tribal Environmental Regs
Here is the opinion in Michigan v. EPA (Michigan v. EPA Opinion). Judge Wood’s opinion begins:
The cultural and religious traditions
of the Forest County Potawatomi Community (“the
Community”) often require the use of pure natural re
The cultural and religious traditions of the Forest County Potawatomi Community (“the Community”) often require the use of pure natural resources derived from a clean environment. Many years ago, the Community became alarmed by increasing pollution levels in its lakes, wetlands, and forests. To remedy this problem, it submitted a request to the Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) to redesignate certain tribal lands from Class II to Class I status under the Prevention of Significant Deterioration (“PSD”) program of the Clean Air Act (“the Act”). This would have the effect of imposing stricter air quality controls on emitting sources in and around the Community’s redesignated lands.
After nearly fifteen years of administrative proceedings and dispute resolution efforts between the Community and neighboring Wisconsin (which were successful) and Michigan (which were not), the EPA promulgated a final ruling redesignating the Community’s lands to Class I status. It also issued two companion announcements concluding dispute resolution proceedings with Wisconsin and Michigan. Michigan seeks review of these three final administrative rulings. It asserts that the EPA pursued the redesignation in an improper manner and, as a result, needlessly complicated Michigan’s air quality control programs. Because Michigan lacks standing to pursue these claims, we dismiss its petition for review.
Briefs are here.
Seventh Circuit Affirms Convictions for Bilking HCN in Casino Fraud
Here is the opening paragraph in United States v. Moore, one of the more entertaining introductions lately:
The time: 6 p.m. The place: Ho-Chunk casino in Baraboo, Wisconsin. The event: a drawing to determine who would walk off with $10,000. Undoubtedly, excitement was in the air. Realistically, the average schlemiel had only a .000067 percent chance of winning. But another participant in the drawing had to like his chances: Bruce Knutson had a 30 percent chance of coming up a winner. And when the winning entry form was pulled from the barrel-ta da-the winner was Bruce Knutson! The lucky winner then posed for a publicity picture, signed off on a tax form, received a check for $5,000, and pocketed $5,000 in cash. It was, we suspect, a night to remember. But all was not, as we shall see, quite as it seemed. The rest of the story explains why Knutson and his buddy, Darwin Moore, are here appealing their convictions after they were found guilty of bilking the casino out of $10,000.
Michigan v. EPA — Mich. AG Challenges Clean Air Act Standards Adopted by Wisconsin Tribe in CA7
Here are the materials:
CA7 Decides Wisconsin v. Stockbridge-Munsee Case
Here is the opinion — ca7-opinion
And here are the materials, including briefs and the lower court opinion.
NYTs: Harlington Wood Obituary
From the NYTs:
Harlington Wood Jr., a federal judge and former Justice Department official who was the government’s chief negotiator during the standoff with American Indian militants in South Dakota that became known as the siege of Wounded Knee, died Dec. 29 in Petersburg, Ill., near Springfield. He was 88.
The cause was complications of a stroke he had in 2002, said his wife, Cathryn.
It was in 1973 that Mr. Wood, then assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, found himself in the middle of a government face-off against a small band of its own citizens.
On Feb. 27, about 200 armed Indians, Oglala Sioux from the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and members of an activist group, the American Indian Movement, took over the reservation hamlet of Wounded Knee, the site of a massacre in 1890 of 300 Sioux by American soldiers. Their idea was to draw attention to what they said was government mistreatment of Indians, corruption in the Bureau of Indian Affairs and tribal government complicity in discrimination.
United States marshals and American troops surrounded the town, and for 10 weeks the two sides traded sporadic fire. Two occupying Indians were killed.
On March 13, Mr. Wood became the first government official to enter Wounded Knee without a military escort. He met with the dissident leaders for two hours and pledged to return with a government proposal for a peace agreement. Five days later, after a trip to Washington, he did, bringing a proposal that was spurned by the occupying Indians and symbolically burned in front of reporters.
That was his last attempt at a negotiation. He became ill shortly afterward — “He used to say he came down with the Sioux flu,” his wife said — and his role was taken up by others. But he was often given credit as the icebreaker; his wedge into the intractable hostilities led to the agreement to end the occupation, which was signed May 6.
Case to Watch — Stockbridge Munsee Reservation Diminishment Case
Years ago, Wisconsin sued the Stockbridge-Munsee Community over the site of its Class III gaming operation, alleging that the land upon which the casino was located was outside the reservation boundaries, or that the reservation had been disestablished. The case is in the Seventh Circuit now and briefing is underway:
1999-dct-opinion-wisconsin-v-stockbridge-munsee
2004-dct-opinion-wisconsin-v-stockbridge-munsee
25th Anniversary of Voigt Decision in Wisconsin
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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