The Indian & The Law -- 2
By THEODORE H. HAAS, Chief Counsel
United States Indian Service
A brief layman's answer to the questions:
1. Whet is an Indian tribe?
2. What is an Indian band?
3. Why is there an Indian Bureau?
4. What power has Congress over Indian affairs?
5. What power has Congress delegated to the Indian Bureau?
6. What power over Indians has Congress transferred to the States?
7. Are there actually any "Indians, not taxed?"
8. What state and federal taxes do Indians pay?
9. What is "Indian title" to land?
10.
Do
Indians generally own the minerals under their lands, and
the forests on it?
11. What are: Allotments, patents in fee, restricted property?
12. Can an Indian reservation include coastal water rights?
13. What is tribal property?
14. Why has the government supervised the leasing of Indian land?
15. May Indian land be "condemned" for public use?
UNITED STATES INDIAN SERVICE
1949
DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
J. A. KRUG, Secretary
UNITED STATES INDIAN SERVICE
JOHN R.
NICHOLS, Commissioner
WILLIAM ZIMMERMAN, JR., Assistant Commissioner
JOHN
H. PROVINSE, Assistant Commissioner
EDUCATION DIVISION
Willard W. Beatty, Director
P. W. Danielson, Associate Director
Haskell Institute
Printing Department
October 1949--10M
Additional copes of this pamphlet may be obtained from
United States Indian
service
Washington 25, D. C.
or
Haskell Institute, Lawrence, Kansas
This is the second of two pamphlets on The Indian and the Law, which between them review the high points of Felix S. Cohen's Handbook on Indian law. They are not exhaustive, but contain a basically correct interpretation of many puzzling questions about the legal status of the American Indian today. Each section summarizes a chapter in Cohen's Handbook, which can be referred to for more complete and exact information. There will be found amplification and profuse citations, as well as four chapters devoted to special problems of a few Indian tribes. Mr. Theodore H. Haas, Chief Counsel for the Indian Service, has prepared this material at my request during his week ends and holidays. He and I have worked together to simplify the language so as to bring the ideas as close to the understanding of a non-technical layman as possible. At the risk of lowering his prestige as a lawyer, Mr. Haas has permitted many of my suggested simplifications to stand, even though he recognized often that I was insisting upon the omission of some stray point that had no pertinence to the main argument, yet the omission of which might lead some carping critic to question his legal thoroughness.
The need for this book grows out of the fact that the status of the Indian today is the result of almost 400 treaties, and more than 5,000 federal statutes relating to Indians. This maze of Indian law was digested in 1937-38, through the efforts of Felix S. Cohen, Assistant Solicitor in the Department of Interior, with the assistance of Theodore H. Haas and others. The Handbook of Indian Law, issued by the Department of Interior in 1941, contains 662 thin but large size Pages of fine print. It is the final resort of those who want to know what is the law. This little pamphlet and its companion can only summarize the substance.
The Education Division of the Indian Service is thankful to Mr. Haas for having prepared this material for use in high schools of the Indian Service, and as an assistance to Tribal Council members and members of Indian tribes in their efforts to understand the legal structure of which they are a part.
August 1949.
Willard W. Beatty,
Director of Education.
ii
CONTENTS
iii
CONTENTS (Continued)
iv