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Show j,S. Judge rules against Ute yibe claims to Uintah lands . ,uh towns of Duchesne nnd within the Uintah and , itftf" !' Reservation, Indian Save.heTX-wertotryand i . non-Indians for criminal I1"1 thin the reservation, U. S. friMntae Bruce S. Jenkins ruled siilt Lake City. fJa!' released bound copies of a ' wal opinion in a suit in which Indian tribe asserted Intv over lands or.ginally reservation. Attached to the !ere another 27 pages of '1L including a map outlining li have been removed from the ' Sn and lands that have not. is shown about 8 miles , the southern boundary of the and Roosevelt is also well inal in the map that Jenkins yi 11, 111 S to the opening of parts of Nation to homesteading about W the century, Jenkins com-' com-' j. "A well-read public was aware that homesteads were ;:Lde available upon an Indian Nation not on lands once xsed by Indians now dispossessed "merely a part of the unreserved ic domain." Judge added that the overall tone - : idence gathered in the case in-..v, in-..v, reservation continues to be the withdrawal of the Gilsonite Strip in 1888 by agreement with the Utes through the withdrawal of l oio 000 acres of timberland and their inclusion in the contiguous national forest and through the withdrawal of nearly 56 000 acres for the Strawberry Reclamation Project by the Act of April 4, lino - "Save as thus expressly diminished the lands of the Uintah Valley Indian Reservation retain continuing status as lands within the boundaries of an Indian In-dian reservation, and are 'Indian Country' as a matter of federal law.... - "That the reservation boundaries of the former Uintah Valley Reservation, now the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation, have been extended by Congress to include the lands known as the Hill Creek Extension pursuant to the Act of March 11, 1948...." Jenkins said the opening of the reservation to settlement was completely com-pletely consistent with continued reservation status. As in another federal suit, this opening did not more than pave the way for non-Indian settlers to own land on a reservation. It did not remove the land from the reservation. He wrote, however, that because of certain withdrawals, the Gilsonite Strip, the Strawberry Project lands and the land of the Uncompahgre Reser- 'todian reservation, "diminished . by the national forest and ;'lberry Project withdrawals.; ; nXins said four conclusions can be , (rom a study of the evidence: That the original boundaries of the ' -nmnahere Reservation as blished by executive order have disestablished by Congress and no ; er exist. Act of June 7, 1897... j. -That the original boundaries of the : -all Valley Indian Reservation have ' " n diminished by Congress through vation that were not included in the Hill (reek Extension to the south of the main part of the reservation no longer are part of the reservation However, the tribe's request for an injunction to keep the defendants from interfering with the exercise of tribal authority "is another matter," Jenkins wrote. The tribe had claimed that it faced immediate, irreparable harm that couldn't be taken care of within the normal legal process if it did not get an injunction. But these claims are nearly six years old and no hard evidence of an immediate im-mediate threat of harm to the tribe has appeared. "Nor should evidence of such a grave threat arise," Jenkins wrote. In 1976, the tribe had issued the Ute Law and Order Code, which caused Duchesne, Roosevelt and Duchesne County to protest that they were wrongfully included within the tribe's jurisdiction. The state also complained its authority was likewise impaired. Faced with mounting opposition to exercise of its authority, the tribe filed a federal suit against Duchesne County and the two cities, seeking to enforce the tribe's rules. The state intervened on behalf of the defendants, and the federal govern- VrT jV7trr ( fort I xVdnk. EXTERIOR BOUNDARY CLAIMS made by the from Indian claims to the rich mineral lands. Ute Tribe to the former Uncompahre Reserva- This map was published by the Uintah Railway tion in southern Uintah County was denied by a about 1905 with the original Indian reservation U.S. District Judge Monday. This ruling will give claims drawn in. oil shale companies leasing lands in this a relief ment and the Paradox Production Corp. entered the case as friends of the court. Uintch County was added later as a defendant. All the defendants have asserted that "Indian Country" in the Uintah Basin is a designation that only applies to land held in trust for individual Indians or the Ute Tribe, and to the Hill Creek Extension. Jenkins said two of the most important im-portant issued are tribal criminal jurisdiction over non-Indians and tribal regulation of non-Indian hunting and fishing on land that does not belong to the Ute tribe. These two issues have already been resolved by a 1978 U. S. Supreme Court ruling. Jenkins said. "The court held that the Indian tribes do not have inherent power to try and punish non-Indians for criminal offenses," of-fenses," he said. In a case decided on March 24, 1981. the United States versus Montana, "The court restricted tribal control of hunting and fishing to Indian-owned and Indian trust lands," Jenkins wrote. Even so, much tribal sovereign authority remains intact, he said. The tribe has the right to tax, license and otherwise control activities of non-members non-members who enter agreements with the tribe or its members. A tribe may also have pow-er to exercise civil authority over the conduct con-duct of non-Indians on private land within the reservation when that conduct threatens or has some direct effect on the political integrity, economic security, health or welfare of the tribe. |
