Worcester v. Georgia
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| Worcester v. Georgia | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Supreme Court of the United States |
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| Argued February 20, 1832 Decided March 3, 1832 |
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| Full case name | Samuel A. Worcester, Plaintiff in Error v. The State of Georgia | |||||
| Citations | 31 U.S. 515 (more) 8 L. Ed. 483 |
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| Prior history | Plaintiff convicted in Gwinnett County, Georgia by the Georgia Superior Court (Sept. 15, 1831) | |||||
| Subsequent history | None | |||||
| Holding | ||||||
| States were not permitted to redraw the boundaries of Indian lands or forbid residence in those territories, because the Constitution granted sole authority to Congress to regulate relations with sovereign States. Superior Court of Gwinnett County, Georgia reversed and remanded. | ||||||
| Court membership | ||||||
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| Case opinions | ||||||
| Majority | Marshall, joined by Johnson, Duvall, Story, Thompson | |||||
| Concurrence | McLean | |||||
| Dissent | Baldwin | |||||
| Laws applied | ||||||
| U.S. Const. art. I | ||||||
Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. (6 Pet.) 515 (1832), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court held that Cherokee Native Americans were entitled to federal protection from the actions of state governments which would infringe on the tribe's sovereignty.
Contents |
[edit] The Case
Georgia law required all whites living in Cherokee Indian Territory to obtain a state license. Seven missionaries refused to obey the state law and were arrested, convicted, and sentenced to four years of hard labor for violating the state licensing law. They also refused to obey the military when they were asked to leave the state. They appealed their case to the Supreme Court of the United States, arguing that the laws they had been convicted under were unconstitutional because states have no power or authority to pass laws concerning sovereign Indian Nations.
The missionaries Samuel Austin Worcester and Elizur Butler were targeted by Georgia because of their influence with and support of Cherokee resistance against removal. It was understood that if they had applied for state licenses to reside among the Cherokees, the licenses would have been denied. The Georgia state courts had previously been deferential to Worcester because of his federal appointment as postmaster to New Echota, the Cherokee capital. However, the governor of Georgia, George Rockingham Gilmer, personally persuaded the federal government to withdraw Worcester's appointment as postmaster in order to make him subject to arrest.
Chief Justice John Marshall laid out in this opinion the relationship between the Indian nations and the United States is that of nations. He argued that the United States, in the character of the federal government, inherited the rights of Great Britain as they were held by that nation. Those rights, he stated, are the sole right of dealing with the Indian nations to the exclusion of any other European power, and not the rights of possession to their land nor political dominion over their laws. He acknowledged that the exercise of conquest and purchase can give political dominion, but those are in the hands of the federal government and not the states.
The court ruled that the Cherokee nation was a "distinct community" with self-government "in which the laws of Georgia can have no force," establishing the doctrine that the national government of the United States, and not individual states, had authority in Indian affairs.
[edit] Response to the Decision
In reaction to this decision, President Andrew Jackson has often been quoted as defying the Supreme Court with the words: "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" However, Jackson never made any such statement.[1] (What Jackson actually said was that "the decision of the supreme court has fell still born, and they find that they cannot coerce Georgia to yield to its mandate.") Arguably because of a legal loophole, he had no grounds for becoming involved unless the Georgia courts formally defied the Supreme Court. That did not happen since Georgia simply abided by the only substantive holding of the decision, and pardoned and freed the plaintiff (albeit after several months of shirking the federal judiciary).[2] In doing so, Georgia underscored the reality of Worcester's true import: despite having no Indian litigants, and thus being incapable of bearing out a holding that could work in their favor in practice, when the decision was cited as precedent in later Indian decisions, like Johnson and Cherokee Nation that preceded it, the case would display inimitable destructive capacity. Marshall used the decision, at least in part, to vindicate the wrongs he perpetrated with "Johnson v. M'Intosh"; Justice Story considered it similarly, writing, in a letter to his wife dated 4 March 1832, "Thanks be to God, the Court can wash their hands clean of the iniquity of oppressing the Indians and disregarding their rights."[3]
Marshall succeeded in Worcester, at least rhetorically, in repudiating some of the "discovery doctrine" put forth in the Johnson decision, but it was largely too late: though Marshall still presided, Jackson had filled the Court with his own appointees, and the damage was done.[4] The removal policy overseen by the second Jackson administration ensured that history would remember Marshall's "Indian Trilogy" no more kindly than it did just the founding Johnson decision.[5] Jackson's opponents criticized him for failing to act against Georgia, but even if he had wanted to intervene—and much evidence suggests that he did not, though the President's position is no longer considered in the strictly polar light that it has been in years past[6]—it is questionable whether he had any legal authority to do so.[7] And in any case, any power disparity between Jackson's Executive and Marshall's Judiciary was irrelevant: Georgia abided by the only immediate holding of the case, seeing clearly that, on releasing the plaintiff, she could continue on the course of her Indian policy with little further judicial ado.[8]
Perhaps fearing the possibility of a showdown between the Supreme Court and the Executive, and realizing the real likelihood of Jackson refusing to adhere to the Court’s pro-Cherokee decision, the Justices did not follow the standard procedure of requiring federal marshals to carry out the decision, despite Georgia's laxity in pardoning and releasing Worcester.[9] In doing so, the Supreme Court implicitly permitted Andrew Jackson not to carry out the decision, thus avoiding the possibility of a political conflict between two branches, while also retaining the pro-Cherokee decision of Worcester as good precedent for subsequent cases and presidents.[10]
There can be no question that Jackson, in both his politics and his policy was supportive of Georgia in its efforts to relocate the Cherokees. Despite winning their case in the Supreme Court, Worcester and Butler remained imprisoned until 1833, when a new governor, Wilson Lumpkin, persuaded them to accept pardons on condition that they would have nothing further to do with the Cherokees. Worcester and Butler were reluctant to accept pardons under such a condition but were eventually pressured to do so by the combined efforts of their lawyers, their missionary organization, and Governor Lumpkin.
According to Chused, Worcester and Butler did return to the Cherokees.[11] Further, they never accepted a formal pardon and they were not given one. Rather, they were released on a general proclamation issued in January 14, 1833.
[edit] Subsequent history
In 1835, a dissident faction of Cherokees signed a removal treaty, the Treaty of New Echota. Jackson actively lobbied the U.S. Senate to ratify the treaty in 1836, where it passed by a majority of one vote. In 1838, under President Martin Van Buren, this led to the forcible relocation by the U.S. Army of the Cherokees to Indian Territory (part of present-day Oklahoma) in what would become known as the Trail of Tears.
[edit] Subsequent judicial impact
Marshall's decision set a strong rule that was followed in future judicial opinions. They are
- U.S. v. Holiday (70 U.S. 407, 1866): Holding that a Congressional ban on selling liquor to the Indians was Constitutional.
- In re Heff (197 U.S. 488, 1905): Holding that Congress has the power to place the Indians under state law if it chooses, and the ban on selling liquor does not apply to Indians subject to the Allotment acts.
- Iron Crow v. Ogallala Sioux Tribe (129 F. Supp. 15, 1955): Holding that tribes have power to create and change their court system and that power is limited only by Congress, not the courts.
- Wisconsin Potowatomies of Hannahville Indian Community v. Houston (393 F. Supp. 719): Holding that tribal law and not state law governs the custody of children domiciled on reservation land.
- Merrion v. Jicarilla Apache Tribe (455 U.S. 130, 1982): Holding that Indian Nations have the power to tax Non-Native Americans based on their power as a nation and treaty rights to exclude others. This right can be curtailed only by Congress.
- American Indian Agricultural Credit Consortium, Inc. v. Fredericks (551 F. Supp. 1020, 1982): Holding that federal, not state courts have jurisdiction over tribal members.
- Maynard v. Narrangansett Indian Tribe (798 F. Supp. 94, 1992): Holding that tribes have sovereign immunity against state tort claims.
- Venetie I.R.A. Council v. Alaska (798 F. Supp. 94): Holding that tribes have power to recognize and legislate adoptions.
- Native American Church v. Navajo Tribal Council (272 F.2d 131): Holding that the First Amendment does not apply to Indian nations unless it is applied by Congress.
- Teague v. Bad River Band (236 Wis. 2d 384, 2000): Holding that tribal courts deserve full faith and credit since they are the court of an independent sovereign; however, in order to end confusion, cases that are filed in state and tribal courts require consultation of both courts before they are decided.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Boller, Paul F.; John H. George (1989). They Never Said It: A Book of False Quotes, Misquotes, & False Attributions. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. p. 53. http://books.google.com/books?id=NCOEYJ0q-DUC&printsec=frontcover.
- ^ Banner, Stuart. How the Indians Lost Their Land: Law and Power on the Frontier. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2005.
- ^ Warren, Charles. The Supreme Court in United States History. 2nd ed. 2 vols. Boston: Little, Brown, 1926. I.757
- ^ Robertson, Lindsay G. Conquest by Law: How the Discovery of America Dispossessed Indigenous Peoples of Their Lands. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2005.
- ^ Robertson 117-44; Banner 220-7.
- ^ e.g., Banner 221-2. Cf. the entirety of Robert A. Williams' work.
- ^ Prucha (1984), p. 212.
- ^ Banner 222. Norgren, Jill. The Cherokee Cases: Two Landmark Federal Decisions in the Fight for Sovereignty. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 2004. 122-30.
- ^ Berutti, Ronald A. (1992). "The Cherokee Cases: The Fight to Save the Supreme Court and the Cherokee Indians". American Indian Law Review 17: 291. At pp. 305–306.
- ^ Lytle, Cliford M. (1980). "The Supreme Court, Tribal Sovereignty, and Continuing Problems of State Encroachment into Indian Country". American Indian Law Review 8: 65. At p. 69.
- ^ Chused, Richard (1999). Cases, Materials, and Problems in Property (2nd ed.). New York: M. Bender. ISBN 0820541354.
[edit] Further reading
- Burke, Joseph C. (1969). "The Cherokee Cases: A Study in Law, Politics, and Morality". Stanford Law Review 21: 500. doi:.
- Prucha, Francis Paul (1984). The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians. I. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0803236689.
- Smith, Jean Edward (1996). John Marshall: Definer Of A Nation. New York: Henry Holt & Company. ISBN 080501389X.
