Indian land dispute could have far-reaching effects

The Associated Press

SYRACUSE, N.Y. - The fight is over 10 small parcels of land in New York's smallest city.

The outcome, though, could affect millions of acres of Indian land throughout the country and change the way Indian lands are taxed and governed, attorneys say.

The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments Tuesday in a tax dispute between the tiny city of Sherrill - covering one and a half square miles with about 3,000 residents - and the prosperous Oneida Indian Nation. A federal district judge and a federal appeals court have previously sided with the Oneidas.

The court's ruling will have far-reaching effects in upstate New York, where more than 330,000 acres are now subject to Indian land claims.

"There are important issues to hopefully be settled. Everyone is watching where the court goes with this," said Madison County Attorney John Campanie.

With profits from its successful Turning Stone Casino and Resort, the Oneidas have acquired nearly 17,000 acres of former reservation land in Madison and Oneida counties, including 10 properties in Sherrill, 35 miles east of Syracuse. The properties include a gas station, a convenience store and a now-closed T-shirt printing plant.

In 2000, the city foreclosed on the 10 properties over $12,000 in unpaid property taxes. The Oneidas said the land had reverted to its reservation status, and was exempt from all local and state laws - including tax laws.

The central question in the case is what happens to land, once part of an Indian reservation, that is reacquired by the tribe. Is the land sovereign, free of all but federal and tribal laws? Or are tribes like any other landowner, subject to local and state laws?

"The (Oneida) land is not contiguous so there is a checker-boarding effect, and that deprives local governments their right to be self-governing," said Campanie, whose county is about 80 percent former reservation land.

"So you have street corners or the middle of a block where they don't have to pay taxes, where local zoning laws don't apply, where police and firefighters have no jurisdiction," Campanie said. "That's chaos."

Sherrill City Attorney Ira Sacks said if the lower court decisions are allowed to stand, "the tax base and viability of cities such as the city of Sherrill - across New York and elsewhere - will be imperiled."

More than a dozen upstate counties contain Indian country or former reservation lands that could be affected by the Supreme Court's decision, said Steve Acquario, interim executive director for the New York State Association of Counties.

"We respect the authority of the federal government, but taxation and jurisdiction have become very volatile issues for a growing number of upstate municipalities," said Acquario, whose organization filed legal papers supporting Sherrill.

The Oneida Indian Nation is one of six nations of the Iroquois Confederacy and its members once lived on about 6 million acres in central New York state, stretching from the Pennsylvania border to the St. Lawrence River and from Lake Ontario to the western foothills of the Adirondack Mountains.

Joined by other Oneidas in Wisconsin and Ontario, New York's Oneidas have been in a long-running land claim lawsuit against New York state for the return of 250,000 acres in Madison and Oneida counties they claim the state illegally bought from the tribes in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a related 1985 case that the Oneidas had a valid claim to their former reservation lands. As a result, land claims by the Mohawks and Cayugas, two other upstate New York tribes, also advanced in the court system, while the state and tribes tried to negotiate settlements.

"The Oneida Nation is hopeful the Supreme Court will recognize its rights on its reservation land," said Oneida spokesman Mark Emery.

John Dossett, the general counsel for the National Congress of American Indians, which represents more than 250 tribes and is the nation's largest American Indian organization, said the law already is clear that local and state governments cannot tax Indians without specific federal legislation passed by Congress approving it. It also is clear, he said, that an Indian reservation can only be disestablished by Congress.

"The federal statutes provide clear, bright lines regarding Indian law," Dossett said. "Our tribes are concerned the Supreme Court will abandon time-honored principles of Indian law and redefine what reservation land is, and that would create chaos."

Even if the decision has limited effect outside of New York, the ramifications will touch tribes from other states, such as the Oneidas of Wisconsin and the Seneca-Cayugas of Oklahoma, both of whom trace their history back to New York and are parties to the New York land claims.

The case is Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York, 03-855.