Land claim decision could affect gambling operations in New York

William Kates

Tuesday, July 5, 2005 | 9:27 a.m.

SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- A federal court ruling has caused historic upheaval in the legal landscape regarding Indian land claims in New York, and has sent all sides scrambling to figure out what's next.

Last week the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City not only overturned a $248 million land claim judgment awarded to the Cayuga Indians by a lower court, but it dismissed the tribe's entire 25-year-old claim.

In reaching its decision, the circuit court relied heavily on the U.S. Supreme Court's March ruling in the Oneida Indian-Sherrill tax case in which the high court said too much time had passed for the Oneidas to claim sovereignty over land they lost 200 years ago and then reacquired.

Municipalities and local elected leaders hailed the circuit court decision as a historic ruling that restores balance to Indian land claims in New York.

However, tribal leaders and some scholars questioned the circuit court's interpretation of the Supreme Court ruling in Sherrill, and were confident it would be overturned.

If not, the circuit court decision -- as is -- would be a "death knell" to all Indian land claims in New York, said Martin Gold, the attorney for the Cayuga Indian Nation of New York.

"I don't know how the circuit court could come to its conclusion. It's clearly an erroneous interpretation," said Robert Odawi Porter, director of Syracuse University's Center for Indigenous Law. "Even the circuit court said there was no question New York ... took tribal lands illegally. The courts have to provide for some type of remedy."

Porter and tribal attorneys noted the Supreme Court made special mention in the Sherrill decision that it was not intended to undermine the previous 20 years of land claim rulings. It was the Supreme Court's 1985 landmark decision that the Oneida Indian Nation had a valid claim for compensation over the wrongful possession of its land that opened the door for New York's other tribes to bring land claims.

The New York Cayugas were to share the $248 million land claim award with the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma.

The Cayugas sued the state in 1980 and won a 1994 ruling that New York illegally acquired 64,015 acres of tribal land in Seneca and Cayuga counties without receiving required congressional ratification. The Cayugas' lawyers have said they will appeal the circuit court decision.

Joseph Heath, the Onondaga's tribal counsel, also was critical of the circuit court, and feared what could come next.

The Onondagas in March became the last of upstate New York's tribes to file a land claim. The Onondagas claimed 4,000 square miles in central New York, including the cities of Syracuse, Binghamton and Watertown.

"It's troublesome. This is such a broad-brush application, it certainly could tar our case ... They just blew off and ignored three decades of evidence, legal precedents and Supreme Court rulings," Heath said. "This says New York can take your land illegally but you have no recourse in the courts."

In the wake of the Supreme Court's Sherrill ruling, local governments immediately pressed forward with tax challenges against the Oneidas in federal and state courts. Elected officials have been emboldened further by the circuit court decision.

The village of Union Springs, for example, is renewing its efforts to close the New York Cayuga's video gaming and high-stakes bingo hall, said Mayor Ed Trufant. The village will go to federal court Aug. 10 to ask a judge to lift his 2004 injunction, which has barred local and state officials from interfering with operation of the hall. The Cayugas opened their bingo hall a year ago, claiming they had sovereign rights to do so because the business lies within the land-claim area.

The Cayugas also face similar legal trouble in the town of Seneca Falls, where they also operate a video-gaming hall. Seneca County Attorney Steven Getman said the county will be looking "at a full range of civil and other legal remedies" regarding the bingo hall and the Cayugas' other properties in the town.

The Supreme Court's decision caused Gov. George Pataki to suspend land-claim settlements reached late last year with the two Cayuga tribes, the Oneida Tribe of Indians of Wisconsin and the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians. The deals would have given the tribes casinos in the Catskills region.

The Indian tribes had used the land claim settlements as leverage for the casino deals. But Scott Wood, a member of the Seneca-Cayugas business council, said he believes the circuit court ruling has now stripped away that leverage.

"The state has absolutely no motivation to talk about anything," Wood said.

Still, Wood believes the ruling will galvanize New York's tribes.

Meanwhile, the circuit court ruling also left a cloud over the land-claim settlement reached in February with the St. Regis Mohawk Tribe.

"The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling is unjust and represents a severe blow to land claims in the state," St. Regis Mohawk Tribal Chief James W. Ransom said in a press release.

The governor's office said it was reviewing the circuit court decision.

Richard Rifkin, a deputy state attorney general overseeing the state's land claim defenses, said the ruling has "significantly strengthened" the state's position and New York will likely ask the courts to apply the 2nd Circuit's legal reasoning to dismiss the other land claims against it.

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