From: Kent Lebsock kent@ailanyc.org
Aug. 31, 2005
Executive Director
AMERICAN INDIAN LAW ALLIANCE
611 Broadway, Suite 632
New York, NY 10012

CERD Decision about the United States

The following deals specifically with a decision by CERD relative to United States discrimination against Indigenous peoples and is a critical step forward in international reaction to the American abuses both contemporary and historical. United Nations calls for U.S. accountability re. Western Shoshone.

United Nations calls for U.S. accountability

by: Brenda Norrell /
Indian Country Today,
Posted: August 29, 2005

GENEVA - A United Nations committee on racial discrimination has asked the United States to respond to the Western Shoshone appeal for urgent intervention, regarding the attack on their spiritual and cultural areas by the United States and mining corporations.

Mario Yutzis, chairman of the U.N. Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, issued a formal letter to the United States and questioned why Western Shoshone sacred land and treaty rights are not being honored.

The committee pressed the United States for an explanation of expanded mining and nuclear waste storage on Western Shoshone ancestral land, and for ''placing their land up for auction for privatization.''

Further, the committee questioned whether the Treaty of Ruby Valley of 1863 has been abrogated and the imposition of grazing fees, trespass and collection notices, horse and livestock impoundments and restrictions on hunting and fishing.

Western Shoshone said their lands cover approximately 60 million acres stretching across what is now referred to as the states of Nevada, Idaho, Utah and California. The United States claims about 90 percent of the land base is ''public'' or federally controlled lands.

Western Shoshone challenge the United States' assertion of ownership, stating that there has never been a legally valid transfer, sale or cession of land by the Western Shoshone.

The United States was asked to report to the U.N. committee on the arrests of Western Shoshone while using lands claimed as their ancestral lands. Further, the United States was asked how it deals with sacred lands and whether it ensures effective participation by indigenous communities in decisions affecting them.

The United States was asked to provide an explanation of the approval of expanded mining activities in the Mt. Tenabo area in Crescent Valley and the approval to store nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain.

''Both areas are of spiritual and cultural importance to the Western Shoshone and are sites where local creation stories originate,'' a Western Shoshone delegation, in Geneva Aug. 8 - 20, said in a statement.

Western Shoshone said the appeal for urgent intervention was taken to prevent further escalation of federal assaults on Western Shoshone people and their ancestral lands. The delegation was and presented the requests.

Chief Raymond Yowell of the Western Shoshone National Council was encouraged by the U.N. response.

''We are pleased that the United Nations committee is willing to look into this. We encourage the U.S. to respond in an honorable manner and to begin to work toward a solution on this long standing matter - for the benefit of all concerned.''

In the August letter, the U.N. committee noted with concern the allegation that Western Shoshone are being denied their traditional rights to land. Further, the committee questioned whether the subsequent use and occupation of these lands by others would cumulatively lead to irreparable harm:

''The committee, in particular, has received information concerning reinvigorated federal efforts to open a nationwide nuclear waste repository on Western Shoshone land; passage of controversial legislation allowing for distribution of compensation for the alleged extinguishment of Western Shoshone title over land; alleged legislative efforts to privatize Western Shoshone lands for transfer to multinational extractive industries and energy developers; and alleged seizures of Western Shoshone livestock and imposition of heavy trespass fines against Western Shoshone people.''

Further, the committee questioned the United States' assertion that the Western Shoshone people lost their rights to their ancestral lands, as identified in the 1863 treaty, as a result of ''gradual encroachment'' by non-American Indians.

The committee asked whether this violated the right of everyone, without discrimination, to own property alone as well as in association with others.

Another issue raised was whether Western Shoshone were involved and informed of the U.S. Indian Claim Commission decision regarding their ancestral lands.

The United States was asked for its response to Western Shoshone protests over compensation in the 2004 Western Shoshone Claims Distribution Act and whether the act was fair and adequate.

Another question raised concerned Western Shoshone's access to the judicial process to assert title to their land.

The committee's letter was issued on the final day of its 67th session, Aug. 19, after a private meeting with representatives from the United States. The United States was informed that the questions presented were based on the request from the Western Shoshone National Council, and by the Western people of the Timbisha Shoshone Tribe, Winnemucca Indian Colony and Yomba Shoshone Tribe.

In the letter, Yutzis said the committee appreciates the frank and open preliminary discussion, which took place Aug. 8 between representatives of the United States and the committee's Working Group on Early Warning and Urgent Action Procedure.

According to Yutzis, the United States assured the committee that reports on Western Shoshone issues, now far behind schedule (they were due in November 2003), are currently being prepared. However, the committee said it regrets that the United States has not agreed to submit the reports by a specific date.

The committee asked for a response to the questions by Dec. 31 for further examination at its next session, beginning Feb. 20, 2006 in Geneva.

-- C 1998 - 2005 Indian Country Today

August 23, 2005

Crescent Valley, Nevada (Newe Sogobia). On the final day of its 67th Session, August 19, 2005, the Chairman of the United Nations Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination issued a formal letter and series of questions to the United States regarding the situation of the Western Shoshone. The letter was issued after a private meeting with representatives from the United States on August 15, 2005 based on requests by the Western Shoshone Nation* that the Committee act under its early warning and urgent action procedure to prevent further escalation of federal assaults on Western Shoshone people and their ancestral lands. A delegation of Western Shoshone traveled to Geneva August 8-20 to present the requests.

A full copy of the letter is attached to this release. Questions range from the U.S.' position on the Treaty of Ruby Valley, seizures of Western Shoshone livestock, efforts to privatize Western Shoshone land to benefit mining and energy industries and ongoing harassment of Western Shoshone people. The Committee asked specifically about United States approval of expanded mining activities in the Mount Tenabo area in Crescent Valley and the approval to store nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. Both areas are of spiritual and cultural importance to the Western Shoshone and are sites where local creation stories originate.

The Committee has asked the United States to respond to the questions by December 31, 2005 for further examination at its next session beginning February 20, 2006 in Geneva Switzerland.

Upon receipt of the letter earlier today, Raymond Yowell, Chief of the Western Shoshone National Council stated:

"We are pleased that the United Nations Committee (CERD) is willing to look into this. We encourage the U.S. to respond in an honorable manner and to begin to work toward a solution on this long standing matter - for the benefit of all concerned."

Western Shoshone lands cover approximately 60 million acres stretching across what is now referred to as the states of Nevada, Idaho, Utah and California. The United States claims around 90% of the land base as "public" or federally-controlled lands. The Western Shoshone challenge the U.S. assertion of ownership stating that there has never been a legally valid transfer, sale or cession of land by the Western Shoshone to the United States.          THE LETTER .pdf

• Urgent Action under Early Warning Measures (Western Shoshone/United States) .pdf
• Request for Early Warning Measures and Urgent Procedures .pdf
• 2nd Request for Urgent Action under Early Warning Procedure to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination of the United Nations .pdf

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Black Mesa Trust sponsors talk:
Federal government may not have the right to lease Hopi assets

May 9, 2005
PRESS RELEASE For Immediate Publication
Contact: Vernon Masayesva (928) 734-9255) or (928) 213-9009

KYKOTSMOVI, Ariz., May 9, 2005-Could a 150-year-old document hold the key to Hopi self-determination?

Quite possibly, explained attorney Lana Marcussen at the Hopi Veterans' Memorial Center on April 28, as she discussed the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. In that treaty, signed after nine years of war between the United States and Mexico, Mexico ceded 55% of its territory-the lands that would become the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California and parts of Colorado, Nevada, and Utah-to the American government in exchange for $15 million in reparations for war damage.

The Mexican government gave up land, but negotiated measures to protect the civil and property rights of its citizens who would be living in territories controlled by the United States. In particular, Article VIII guaranteed, "In the said [ceded] territories, property of every kind, now belonging to Mexicans not established there, shall be inviolably respected. The present owners, the heirs of these, and all Mexicans who may hereafter acquire said property by contract, shall enjoy with respect to it guaranties equally ample as if the same belonged to citizens of the United States," (quoted from a 2004 U.S. Government Accounting Office document, "Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo: Findings and Possible Options Regarding Longstanding Community Land Grant Claims in New Mexico").

Ms. Marcussen is an expert in water law, Indian law, and public land law. She has an extensive knowledge of Spanish land grants, and it is on the basis of those land grants given by Spain to the indigenous peoples of the "Americas" that the Hopi may be able to claim real property rights in the land, water, and minerals of their homeland. Hopi real property rights would supersede all other rights, including those claimed by the federal government.

Ms. Marcussen explained to an audience overflowing the meeting room that at its most profound basis, the issue is sovereignty. Under the United States Constitution, power is distributed between two sovereigns, the federal government on the one hand and state governments on the other. Under this principle, the third sovereign is the people, as individuals and as a group, and the people's rights are superior to both federal rights and states' rights. Tribal sovereignty, not specified by the Constitution, has had to find its place within this basic structure. Ever since the federal government "conquered" the indigenous peoples of this country, it has declared itself the principle sovereign over those peoples. The Hopis and other tribes have a little sovereignty, as much as the federal government thinks they should have at any given time, and the federal government holds Indian property in trust to do with as it sees fit, in principle if not in reality, for the benefit of the Indians.

The Treat of Guadalupe Hildalgo turns this theory upside down. "Because the Mexican government recognized you as individual sovereigns together in a city (or pueblo), your right is superior, as is your right to control, without the permission or participation of the federal government, your land and your water," said Ms. Marcussen. She explained that while the Hopi have not yet asserted their sovereign rights, other Pueblo Indians have, and they have won in court. She further explained that the rights of Pueblo people as individuals take precedence over the rights of the tribal governments, which were imposed on the tribes by the federal government by the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934. When the federal government accepted Article VIII of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, it committed to protecting all of the property of the people who chose to remain where they were in the lands ceded by Mexico.

These people were Mexican citizens, and the U.S. promised to respect their rights as such, whether they chose to remain Mexican citizens and relocate, or they chose to stay where they were and eventually become citizens of the United States.

The federal government then set about determining how much land belonged to the Pueblo peoples under the terms of the Treaty. In California, they asked the Pueblo peoples in 1851 to provide proof of their land grants and pretty much accepted all of the land claims that were filed. The federal government lost one half of California and realized that it had made a mistake.

In response, the government in 1854 radically changed the criteria for proof of Spanish or Mexican land grants in Arizona and New Mexico. Rather than asking people to bring in their original land grants, the government sent out its own surveyor. If the official surveyor thought someone had a claim, that person would be allowed to bring his papers into court and the court would decide whether to allow the claim. Some scholars have estimated that only about 25% of the original Spanish land grants were recognized in New Mexico (of which Arizona was originally a part), while the GAO report states that as many as 55% were recognized, but in any case, all 23 claims submitted by the Pueblos of what is now the State of New Mexico were eventually proved and honored. On that basis Ms. Marcussen and her colleagues have won primary water rights-not federal reserved rights-for tribes in New Mexico.

So where does this leave the Hopi? The pueblos of the Southwest were given land grants in part because after the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, the Catholic Pope declared that the Pueblo Indians, by virtue of the fact that they lived in cities and had a social and political organization sophisticated enough to drive the priests out of the Southwest at will, which is what they did in 1680, were civilized people (and, incidentally, would make good soldiers). As the Spanish military and clergy re-entered the Southwest, they started issuing land grants to the pueblos as well as to Spanish individuals. Since the Spanish visited Hopi as early as 1540, it is likely that there is a land grant to the Hopi (or, as they were called then, the Moqui). And if there is, the Hopi are entitled to Article VIII rights under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. That means that when the federal government holds land or water or natural resources in trust for the Hopi, it is merely a trustee, not a sovereign. Therefore, it does not have the right to negotiate the sale or lease of that property, much less force the Hopi to accept the terms that the federal government has set in collusion with the Department of the Interior for the benefit of multinational corporate interests.

"If you really have Article VIII rights, real property rights," said Ms. Marcussen, "you as individuals and as a people have superior rights. If we can establish that you have Article VIII rights, you are the sovereign. If you are the sovereign, you can say, 'I don't care what you pay; we will not sell.'"

While Ms. Marcussen stated that the United States government is still having a difficult time accepting that Indian peoples could have real property rights, those rights have been affirmed by the courts for the New Mexico pueblos and for the Tohono O'odham in Arizona.

When Ms. Marcussen completed her talk, one of the many Hopi elders who were present said, "This gives us lots of energy and hope; it is reminding us of something we already knew, and shows how we might go forward."

Ms. Marcussen's presentation was hosted by Black Mesa Trust as part of its celebration of the Decade of Water. Dedicated to preserving the N-aquifer for future generations of Hopi and Navajo children and to fostering the sustainable and just use of water around the world, the Trust is sponsoring a run from the Hopi Village of Lower Moencopi to Mexico City in March 2006. Native American runners will present indigenous water concepts and ethics to an international audience of world leaders at the Fourth World Water Forum.

Organizations supporting Black Mesa Trust are the Arizona Ethnobotanical Research Association, Black Mesa Water Coalition, Environment Now, Grand Canyon Trust, Honor the Earth, Indigenous Water Institute, Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Natural Resources Defense Council, Sacred Land Film Project, Sierra Club, Shanker Law Firm, Shearman & Sterling, Toh Nizhoni Ahni, and WaterKeeper Alliance. Supporting Foundations include Acorn Foundation. The Christensen Fund, Oxfam America, Patagonia, Quinney Foundation, SB Foundation, Seventh Generation Fund, and Walton Family Foundation.

For more information about Black Mesa Trust, visit www.blackmesatrust.org or call (928) 213-9009 or (928) 734-9255. For more information about the Hopi to Mexico City Run in 2006, visit www.h2opirun.org or call Ruben Saufkie, run coordinator, at (928) 734-5438.

Photo captions:

	Ms. Marcussen explained what the terms of the treaty could mean to Hopi sovereignty.
	An overflow crowd turned up to hear Ms. Marcussen's talk about how the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo could affect Hopi rights.

Black Mesa Trust sponsors talk: Fed gov may not have the right to lease Hopi assets.doc

Shoshone Nation aims to stop Yucca nuke dump

Lawyer for tribe argues that its sacred traditions
and beliefs being violated by Energy Department

April 28, 2005
By Ed Koch Las Vegas Sun
www.lasvegassun.com/dossier/nuke/

LAS VEGAS - There is a centuries-old story of Snake Mountain that is still taught to the children of the Western Shoshone Nation.

"Someday when we wake that snake up . it will get mad and rip open," Shoshone Spiritual Leader Corbin Harney wrote in his 1995 book "The Way it Is - One Water, One Air, One Mother Earth."

"With his tail, that snake will move the mountain, rip it open and the poison will come out on the surface."

Today Snake Mountain is called Yucca Mountain, site of the under-construction high-level nuclear waste repository, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas and about 15 miles east of Death Valley in Inyo County.

Robert Hager, the lawyer for the Shoshone tribe, got the OK Wednesday from U.S. District Judge Philip Pro to submit that story as part of Harney's affidavit into the court record of a lawsuit the tribe hopes will halt the nuclear waste dump.

Pro, following an hourlong hearing, took under advisement the Western Shoshone Nation's request for an injunction to stop the project.

Although Hager did not specifically make an argument to stop the project on First Amendment grounds that the Shoshone people are being denied the right of freedom of religion, he gave the Energy Department, overseers of Yucca Mountain, a good indication of where this case eventually may be headed.

Hager, supported by Harney's affidavit, argued that Yucca Mountain is being "desecrated" by the project, that the Indians are being denied access to the sacred rock prayer rings where "the Great Spirit" sends them messages and that bodies of the Indians' ancestors have been disrupted by tunneling.

"The rock rings at Yucca Mountain are very sacred places where the Shoshone people prayed, and when our people pray at the rock rings the message comes and goes through those rings," Harney says in his affidavit.

"I am aware the bodies of some of our ancestors have been removed from Yucca Mountain by government agents, which is a violation of our sacred traditions and beliefs that the body of a person who dies should be buried and should remain at the place where that life ended."

Harney, who is now 85, was among two dozen members of the tribe in Pro's courtroom Wednesday. He and other Shoshones said they no longer have access to the rock ring area.

Hager also said Shoshones already are being poisoned by the project and that as many as 2,500 of them are at risk of getting silicosis - fibrosis of the lungs caused by long-term exposure to silica dust - from the project.

The federal government countered that the Shoshones are barking up the wrong tree by seeking injunctive relief in Las Vegas federal district court, arguing that the Washington, D.C., Circuit Court or the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has jurisdiction in this matter.

Justice Department Attorney Sara Culley said the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which places such matters before the court of appeals, applies in this case. The Shoshones are asking for their injunction by arguing that another statute, the Yucca Mountain Development Act, is unconstitutional.

Pro said jurisdiction is a key question with which he must wrestle.

"I have to stay focused on whether I have jurisdiction," Pro told both sides.

Hager argued that not only does Pro have jurisdiction in this case as set forth by the Ruby Valley Treaty of 1863, which specifies uses for the tribe's nearly 60 million acres, Pro also has the power to rule that the Yucca Mountain Development Act is unconstitutional because it is "based on lies."

He was referring to the revelation in late March by Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman that employees of the U.S. Geological Survey had written e-mail messages indicating some scientific work had been falsified.

Internal Energy Department e-mails written in preparation for seeking a license to open the nuclear waste repository indicate the alleged falsification focused on the speed at which water flowed through the mountain, an issue that would have meant disqualification of the Yucca site years ago, Hager told Pro.

Hager argued that the president and Congress relied on those tainted reports as sound scientific evidence to pass and sign into law the development act, and that such actions make the statute unconstitutional.

Culley said to stop the project now will be detrimental to many phases including environmental and scientific studies that "Congress has determined is in the best interest of the public."

She said a ruling in favor of the Shoshones also would halt long-term monitoring of the site and electrical maintenance, as well as put 1,600 Energy Department employees out of work.

"The site will fall into disrepair," she said of a lengthy stoppage.

As for removal of Indian bodies from Yucca, Culley said the Shoshones have been invited to "walk through the site" to observe future tunneling, which she said will not occur again for four years. Drilling, however, is continuing, she said.

And Culley said the Indians are not in any immediate harm because environmental protections are in place and that the long process toward licensing involves public input, and that includes the concerns of the Shoshones. She said the earliest date for storing nuclear waste there is 2010.

Culley said the Shoshones will "not likely prevail on the merits" in part because courts long ago determined the Indians do not have title to the land.

Last year, President Bush signed a measure to distribute $145 million to approximately 10,000 Western Shoshone as compensation for land that was taken from the tribe.

The tribe has refused to accept the money and in March filed its lawsuit to stop the nuclear dump project.

Western Shoshone National Council Member John Wells said after the hearing that the government's argument that the tribe no longer owns title to the land should not apply in this case.

"The government should abide by the treaty," Wells said, noting that when American Indians refer to land they are talking about Mother Earth that everyone owns and shares, "not the government's European concept of land ownership."

The treaty specifies the U.S. government can use the land for settlements, mines, ranches and the construction of roads and railroads. Wells said that had the government proposed storing hazardous materials in Yucca Mountain at the time the treaty was signed the Shoshones "definitely would have said no."

Western Shoshone Nation Chief Raymond Yowell said after the hearing that some members of the tribe still call the site Snake Mountain and that the story of it rising up and spewing poison "was the vision of a holy man long before the White Man came.

"Of course, that holy man could not have known about the circumstances now, but, in his vision, he foresaw that one day energy could explode from the mountain. We want to stop that from happening. Mother Earth is sacred to us."

(Distributed by Scripps-McClatchy Western Service) C2005 The Inyo Register pub@inyoregister.com Copyright C 2005 The Inyo Register http://www.inyoregister.com

PRINTABLE VERSION ROBERT R. HAGER, ESQ., #1482 TREVA J. HEARNE, ESQ. #4450 910 Parr Blvd. Reno, NV 89512 Tel: (775) 329-5800 Fax: (775) 329-5819 Attorneys for Plaintiffs UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF NEVADA   WESTERN SHOSHONE NATIONAL COUNCIL, JOE KENNEDY, JOHN WELLS PAULINE ESTEVES, and KEVIN GILLETTE, Plaintiffs, v.   UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, SAMUEL BODMAN, Secretary of the United States Department of Energy, and GALE NORTON, Secretary of the United States Department of the Interior, Defendants. __________________________________/ Case No: CV-S-05-0290-PMP-LRL   PLAINTIFFS’ REPLY IN SUPPORT OF MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION I. SINCE THE COMMENCEMENT OF THIS ACTION, DEFENDANT BODMAN HAS ADMITTED THAT AGENTS OF THE DEFENDANTS HAVE MISREPRESENTED THE FACTS TO REQUEST AND OBTAIN CONGRESSIONAL AND PRESIDENTIAL APPROVAL OF THEIR YUCCA MOUNTAIN PLAN; THEREFORE DEFENDANTS ARE ESTOPPED FROM OPPOSING A PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION. This action was commenced on March 4, 2005. On March 16, 2005, Defendant Bodman, in his official capacity as Secretary of Energy, issued a press release on the official website of the United States Department of Energy wherein Defendant Bodman admitted that he was aware of emails regarding the Defendants’ planned Yucca Mountain project, which reflected intentional misrepresentation of scientific data used to seek and obtain Congressional and Presidential approval of the project since 1998. (Exhibit 1, Press Release from Department of Energy) These intentional misrepresentations of scientific fact upon which Congressional and Presidential approval were based were, thereafter, covered up for approximately seven years. The misrepresentations related to the knowledge of how rapidly water moves through Yucca Mountain, which was the very basis for a Petition sent to Defendant Bodman’s predecessor in 1998. Virtually every major environmental group in the United States and around the world requested that the then Secretary of Energy acknowledge the unsuitability of the Yucca site due to water infiltration and the fast flow rate of water, the single most important public safety and environmental issue of all. (See Exhibit 2, Affidavit of Kevin Kamps and attached Petition). The response of the Departments of Energy and Interior to that Petition was to intentionally misrepresent the facts relating specifically to water infiltration and flow rate, and to, then, cover-up those misrepresentations for the next seven years while they affirmatively sought and obtained further Congressional and Presidential approval of the project based upon those misrepresentations. The circumstances surrounding the intentional misrepresentations of water infiltration at the Yucca site indicate that those misrepresentations and the subsequent seven year cover-up were not inadvertent or insignificant, but were, instead, the specific response to the identification by top scientists around the world to that specific scientific reason why the Yucca site should be deemed unsuitable for long term storage of high level nuclear waste. Having intentionally misrepresented the science upon which Congressional and Presidential approval was based, Defendants now argue that the approval obtained for Yucca Mountain under the Nuclear Policy Act prevents Plaintiffs from asking this Court to preliminarily enjoin Defendants based upon that same fraudulently obtained approval. Defendants ask this Court to overlook the fraud committed to obtain Congressional and Presidential approval of the Yucca project in 2002, and to completely disregard the fact that approval was based upon intentional misrepresentation of the most material scientific facts. Carrie Dann, a member of the Western Shoshone National Council, signed the Petition (Exhibit 2) informing the Secretary of the Department of Energy that the water infiltration data was faulty and could not be relied upon for the decision to choose Yucca Mountain. The Plaintiffs, by representation, have been involved in the scientific matters and the environmental safety matters since the beginning of Yucca Mountain, and have also been the intended parties that were given faulty information by the government. Since 1998 the Plaintiffs have been advocating that the data was false. Defendant Bodman has now admitted that the Department of Energy and the Department of the Interior knew the data was false in 2002 when the Nuclear Policy Act was adopted by Congress on the recommendation of the Department of Energy, but have only revealed their knowledge in 2005. Defendant Bodman has admitted that knowledge of the falsity was concealed until March 16, 2005. The traditional elements of equitable estoppel require a showing that: (1) the party to be estopped knows the facts; (2) the party intends that his or her conduct will be acted on;(3) the latter must be ignorant of the true facts; and he must rely on the former’s conduct to his injury. . . . A party seeking to invoke estoppel against the government must satisfy two requirements in addition to those ordinarily applicable. Watkins v. United States Army, 875 F.2d 699, 707 (9th Cir. 1989) (en banc), Petition for cert. filed, 58 U.S.L.W. 3771 (U.S. May 21, 1990) (No. 89-1806). First, it must establish “affirmative conduct going beyond mere negligence.” (Quoting Wagner v. Director, Fed. Emergency Management Agency, 847 F.2d 515, 519 (9th Cir. 1988). Second, it must show that the government’s act will cause a serious injustice and the imposition of estoppel will not unduly harm the public interest. S&M Investment Co, v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, 911 F.2d 324, 329 (1990) Accord, Salgado-Diaz v. Gonzales, 2005 U.S. App. LEXIS 4015 (January 31, 2005) The Department of Energy engaged in affirmative conduct that went beyond mere negligence by submitting flawed data to the Congress upon which the decision was made by Congress to adopt the Nuclear Policy Act. The Department of Energy certainly believed and intended for Congress to act on the facts that the DOE submitted to it stating that Yucca Mountain had been investigated and the data supported choosing it as the site. For the Secretary of Energy, defendant herein, to now, in 2005, reveal to the citizens of the United States and Congress that the data was flawed just after the DOE requested further funding for the Yucca Mountain project, indicates that the government’s act has and will cause a serious injustice. The public interest will not only not be harmed by imposing equitable estoppel upon the government, the public interest will be safeguarded from such overt acts of governmental deceit. The government is clearly estopped from arguing that the Nuclear Policy Act is an impediment to this litigation and request for preliminary injunction. II. THE UNITED STATES HAS WAIVED ITS SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY FOR PURPOSES OF DECLARATORY AND INJUNCTIVE RELIEF IN THE ISSUES RAISED BY THIS CASE. As a general rule, federal courts have jurisdiction to hear and decide claims by an Indian tribe against the United States arising under federal law. Gila River Indian Community v. Henningson, Durham and Richardson, 626 F.2d 708, 711 (9th Cir. 1980). The Ruby Mountain Treaty is federal law, found at Treaty with The Western Shoshone, 1863; 18 Stat. 689, Ratified June 26, 1866, Proclaimed October 21, 1869. Further this request before the Court is a challenge to an Administrative decision. The Plaintiffs have asked the Defendants to correct an incorrect use of the land and such an act is properly governed by the Administrative Procedure Act. 5 U.S.C.§ 702. The Pueblo Sandia requested a lot line adjustment and the Court found that a waiver of sovereign immunity was available for such a question because it was not a claim for land but a change in the use and quantity of land for use. See, Pueblo of Sandia v. Babbitt, 1996 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 20619 (1996). Accord, Pueblo of Taos v. Andrus, 475 F. Supp. 359 (U.S. D.C. 1979). Similarly, the Western Shoshone Nation is asking this Court to prohibit the use of land in a way that was not contemplated by the Treaty so that these issues can be more appropriately heard on the merits. IV. INTERPRETING THE TREATY IN HISTORICAL CONTEXT AND ON THE PLAIN MEANING OF ITS WORDS, IT IS CLEAR THAT THE LIMITATIONS ON USE OF LANDS WITHIN WESTERN SHOSHONE TERRITORY ARE ENFORCEABLE COVENANTS AND RESTRICTIONS WHICH RUN WITH THE LAND REGARDLESS OF WHO LATER ACQUIRES TITLE TO THOSE LANDS. A. The Defendant United States of America admitted as recently as September 1986, that the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley was in full force and effect, and. moreover, the Treaty remains in full force and effect. In the United States of America v. Mary Dann and Carrie Dann, Civil R-74-60 BRT, the Defendant United States of America admitted that the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley remained in full force and effect, as reflected by the attached Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law filed on September 15, 1986. In that ruling, the Court found specifically at Paragraph 4 on Page 2 that “The Government has admitted that the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley is in full force and effect.” (See Exhibit 3, Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law). Further the United States Supreme Court in the Dann case, United States v. Dann, 470 U.S. 39; 105 S.Ct. 1058; 84 L.Ed.2d 28 (1985) made no finding about the individual aboriginal rights, only that the claims paid were considered paid as of the date the United States set aside the money whether that money had been paid to the Tribe or not. Those claims have not been paid to this date. Those persons who were parties to that case may be foreclosed from making further claims, as argued by the government, but the Supreme Court specifically did not rule on the individual aboriginal claims: The Danns also claim to possess individual as well as tribal aboriginal rights and that because only the latter were before the Indian Claims Commission, the “final discharge” of §22(a) does not bar the Danns from raising individual aboriginal title as a defense in this action. Though we have recognized that individual rights may exist in certain contexts, this contention has not been addressed by the lower courts and, if open, should first be addressed below. We express no opinion as to its merits. At pages 1064, 1065 The government incorrectly relies on the resolution of the claims of the Western Shoshone as having been decided by the Dann case. Neither the parties nor the issues had the identity necessary the bar the Western Shoshone National Council from a case regarding the taking of their lands. The United States District Court for the Northern District of New York when interpreting the Treaty of the Cayuga Indian Nation and found that the release and relinquishment of Treaty rights are very specific and the terms are strictly construed and prior judgments cannot be res judicata unless there is an identity of issues and parties. A claim or defense brought in a subsequent proceeding is barred by the doctrine of res judicata if “ 1) the prior action involved an adjudication on the merits, 2) the prior action involved the same parties or their privies and 3) the claims asserted in the subsequent action were raised in the prior action. Cayuga Indian Nation of New York v. Village of Union Springs, 317 F. Supp.2d 128, 140 (U.S.D.C. No. Dist. NY 2004). B. The Treaty is the subject of other litigation and this Court is only being asked to maintain the status quo, an uncontaminated site, to preserve the lands that the Western Shoshone are fighting to retain. Defendants rely simultaneously upon the arguments that the Western Shoshone never really held title to the lands described in the Treaty as “Western Shoshone Territory,” and that Western Shoshone title was extinguished by gradual encroachment and taking in 1872. In other words, Defendants argue that the Western Shoshone never really owned Western Shoshone Territory, “and if they did, we took it from them.” The issues of title and taking are presently before the Northern Division of this Court in Case Number CV-N-04-0702-LRH-VPC. Yucca Mountain is located geographically within the Southern Division of this Court. The present case is not premised upon title to Yucca Mountain, and Plaintiffs respectfully request that the Court rule on this instant Motion without addressing the issue of title. Cases involving Indian Treaties and title are often inconsistent and distinguished based upon the context in which Indian title is raised. In this case, Plaintiffs argue that the restrictions on use specifically provided for under the Treaty were bargained-for considerations upon which both parties agreed. It is important to note that virtually all of the present use of lands described in the Treaty as Western Shoshone Territory are consistent with the uses agreed upon in the Treaty. No evidence exists that the Western Shoshone were ever told at the time the Treaty was negotiated that, by entering into the Treaty, the Western Shoshone agreed that their lands would later be the dumping ground of the most toxic substance ever known to man, accumulated from this country and 41 other countries around the world. Instead, what was clearly disclosed by the agents for the United States to Western Shoshone leaders was the intention to use Western Shoshone lands for only those purposes specifically set forth and agreed to by both parties to the Treaty. The canons of statutory construction help give meaning to these words. “. . .a fundamental canon of construction provides that ‘unless otherwise defined, words will be interpreted as taking their ordinary, contemporary, common meaning.” United States v. Smith, 155 F/3d 1051. 1057 (9th Cir. 1998) “Treaties with the United States regarding the disposition of Indian land must be interpreted in the same way as statutory language, that is to say, congressional intent to terminate Indian title must be clearly expressed.” Citing Hagen v. Utah, 510 U.S. 399, 423; 127 L.Ed.2d 252; 114 S.Ct. 958 (1994). See, Cayuga Indian Nation of New York v. Village of Union Springs, 317 F. Supp 2d 128 (U.S. D.C. No. Dist. NY 2004). Accord. Menominee Tribe v. United States, 391 U.S. 404 (1968). Acccord: U.S. v. Bay Mills Indian Community, 653 F.2d 277 (6th Cir. 1981). Accord: Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians v. Wisconsin, 700 F.2d 341 (7th Cir. 1983). The language of the Treaty is clear that the uses that the United States were to be allowed on the lands of the Western Shoshone were mining and building railroads and communities, not accumulating toxic waste that would contaminate the earth for 10,000 years. The government argues that the treaties with the Shoshone people were interpreted by in the Northwestern Bands case. The Western Shoshone National Council, nor the Western Shoshone people were parties to the Northwestern Bands case. The Western Shoshone National Council was not a party to the Dann case cited in the opposing papers of the government. Those cases are not binding upon the Western Shoshone National Council in interpreting the Ruby Valley Treaty nor for purposes of this litigation. No doubt, an analysis of the legal history of the United States Courts and their treatment of Indian claims is not consistent. This is because each Treaty must be considered in the circumstances and historical context in which it was executed. In the case of the United States v. Shoshone Tribes of Indians, 304 U.S. 111 (1938) the Supreme Court made findings on elemental issues of Indian land rights. . . . although the United States always had legal title to the land and power to control and manage the affairs of the Indians, it did not have power to give to others or to appropriate to its own use any part of the lands without rendering, or assuming the obligation to pay, just compensation to the tribe for that would not be the exercise of guardian ship or management, but confiscation. At page When interpreting the treaty with the Eastern Shoshone, the Court adopted the standard that has been the guiding rule when Treaties with the Indians are at issue. “. . .the settled policy of the United States fairly to deal with Indian tribes. In treaties made with them the United States seeks no advantage for itself; friendly and dependent Indians are likely to accept without discriminating scrutiny the terms proposed. They are not to be interpreted narrowly, as sometimes may be writings expressed in words of art employed by conveyancers, but are to be construed in the sense in which naturally the Indians would understand them. Worcester v. Georgia, 6 Pet. 515, 582; Jones v. Meechan, 175 U.S. 1, 11, 20 S.Ct. 1; Starr v. Long Jim, 227 U.S. 613, 622, 623 S., 33 S. Ct. 358. The reason this rule of treaty interpretation is critical is that the circumstances of the Western Shoshone when they entered into the Treaty of Ruby Valley will be an intensive fact circumstance left to the determination of the Court in Case No. CV-04-0702-LRH(VPC) For this reason and because each fact situation was different regarding the four treaties of the Shoshone entered into in and around the Civil War, the Western Shoshone have a higher degree of probability of prevailing on the merits of their claim. The Court in Shoshone Tribes of Indians recognized that “The right of perpetual and exclusive occupancy of the land is not less valuable than full title in fee.” Even if the United States retained the fee title, while the Tribe retained the right of occupancy, the right of use, and, for the purposes of this litigation, the right of reversion, the lands must remain uncontaminated for the resolution of the lands issues. The Court found that even if “the tribe’s right of occupancy was incapable of alienation or of being held otherwise than in common, that right is as sacred and as securely safeguarded as is fee simple absolute title. Cherokee Nation v. State of Georgia, 5 Pet. 1, 48; Worcester v. State of Georgia, Shoshone Tribes of Indians, cited supra, at page 580. These last cited cases were handed down at a time in our country’s history when the preservation of Indian lands was not the priority of the government nor the citizenry. Today, 2005, in a time when this country espouses the human rights violations that ravage the citizenry of China, Africa and other countries who have not heartily embraced the values of democracy and the worth of the individual, surely, the rights of the first Americans to their ancestral lands is a more viable and valued claim. The United States relies upon the Northwestern Bands case which was issued in 1940. The cases respecting the rights and lands of the Indian nations has been more recent and evidence of the change of legal reasoning regarding the preservation of Indian rights and lands making the Northwestern Bands case distinguishable from the matters at issue in this proceeding. In 1999 the United States Supreme Court found that the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians retained their usufructuary rights to the lands they had ceded by Treaty to the United States. “The Chippewa’s usufructuary rights were not extinguished when Minnesota was admitted to the Union. Congress must clearly express an intent to abrogate Indian treaty rights, United States v. Dion, 476 U.S. 734, 734-740, 90 L.Ed. 2d 767, 106 S.Ct. 2216, and there is no clear evidence of such an intent here.” Minnesota et al v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, et al., 526 U.S. 172, 176; 119 S.Ct. 1187; 143 L.Ed.2d 270 (1999). This case is much more in line with the recent considerations of preservation of Indian lands and rights, i. e United States v. Alcea Band of Tillamooks et al, 329 U.S. 40, 67 S.Ct. 167, 91 L.Ed. 29 (1946) (“in our opinion, taking original Indian title without compensation and without consent does not satisfy the ‘high standards for fair dealing’ required of the United States in controlling Indian affairs. United States v. Santa Fe Pacific R. Co., 314 U.S. 339, 356 (1941). The Indians have more than a merely moral claim for compensation.) At page 46. The United States had repeatedly and consistently required that the tribes convey their right, title and interest to the lands that they claimed in several Treaties of the time. (See, Exhibit 4) The United States and its agents were fully cognizant of the implications of reserving the land to the Western Shoshone people subject to the right to use the land for certain specified and named uses by the emigrants of the United States. The Western Shoshone have a long history of pursuing a fair hearing on their rights to the lands that they have held since time immemorial. (See, “Constructive Conquest in the Courts: A Legal History of the Western Shoshone Lands Struggle - 1861 to 1991" 42 Nat. Resources J. 765 (2002). That is not the issue before this Court. In order for the Western Shoshone to have the right to seek a resolution to the issue of the rights to their Indian lands, the lands must remain in tact. The United States District Court for the District of Alaska entered a preliminary injunction until a trial on the merits could be concluded to resolve the claims of the native Thlingit Indians. See, U.S. v. State of Alaska, 197 F. Supp. 834(U.S. Dist. Alaska 1961) The State of Alaska was prepared to fill the tidelands claimed by the Indians and the Court realized that irreparable injury would occur and without the preliminary injunction, the lands would be lost whatever the final outcome of the trial on the merits. Likewise, to allow the government to bring nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain precludes any resolution of the claims of the Western Shoshone to Yucca Mountain. IV THE WESTERN SHOSHONE NATIONAL COUNCIL FAIRLY REPRESENTS THE WESTERN SHOSHONE PEOPLE WHO ENTERED INTO THE RUBY VALLEY TREATY AND THE WESTERN SHOSHONE PEOPLE WHO NOW HAVE THE RIGHT TO PRESERVE THESE LANDS FOR THEIR FUTURE GENERATIONS. The Western Shoshone National Council consists of a representative from each of the following groups: Traditional Western Shoshone Cattlemen, Ely Western Shoshone Tribe, Timbisha Western Shoshone people, Great Basin Descendants of the Western Shoshone, Southern Western Shoshone, the Dann Band and the Yomba Reservation of the Western Shoshone. The Western Shoshone National Council represents over 10,000 Shoshone people who are the descendants of the persons who were represented by the signors of the Ruby Valley Treaty. (Exhibit 5, Affidavit of Raymond Yowell) The government attacks the standing of these Western Shoshone to represent themselves and the other people of their nation. The Supreme Court found that being deprived of any interest in land was a “sufficient injury-in-fact to satisfy the case-or-controversy requirement of Article II of the Constitution.” Hodel v. Irving, 481 U.S. 704, 705 (1987) The Supreme Court found that even if the Plaintiffs were not asserting their own property rights, but those decedents’ and future decedents. Certainly, then, the decendents of the signors of the Ruby Valley Treaty who are the Western Shoshone Nation have standing since it is their reversionary rights to the lands of their forefathers that are being lost forever by the nuclear dump proposed by the United States. The Western Shoshone National Council incorporates by reference the entirety of the Amicus Brief submitted by the Indigenous Law Institute in Support of Plaintiffs which brief supports the arguments herein. The Western Shoshone have a sacred and cultural claim to Yucca Mountain. See, Affidavit of Corbin Harney, attached Legend of Yucca Mountain, (Exhibit 6). The Western Shoshone have a historical right, a Treaty right from both the Ruby Valley Treaty of 1863 and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo , and a moral right to have the lands of their ancestors preserved and protected so that their right of use and occupancy can remain for time immemorial as it has been subject only to the conditions that they agreed to in a desperate moment in the Ruby Valley to save their own lives and the small hope that a remnant of the Western Shoshone people would continue on the earth. CONCLUSION Based on the aforementioned, Plaintiffs respectfully request that the Court preliminarily enjoin the Defendants from taking any further steps to license or develop the Yucca Mountain for the storage of nuclear waste. DATED this ___day of April, 2005. LAW OFFICE OF HAGER & HEARNE _______________________________ ROBERT R. HAGER, ESQ, #1482 TREVA J. HEARNE, ESQ., #4450 910 Parr Blvd., #8 Reno, NV 89512 Attorneys for Plaintiff CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE Pursuant to FRCP 5(b), I hereby certify that I am an employee of the LAW OFFICE OF HAGER & HEARNE, and that on this date, I mailed, U.S. mail, postage prepaid, a true and correct copy of the PLAINTIFFS REPLY IN SUPPORT OF THE MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION, to the following addresses: Thomas Sansonetti Assistant Attorney General Environment and Natural Resources Division U.S. Dept. Of Justice Blaine Welsh Assistant United States Attorney 333 Las Vegas Blvd., So., #5000 Las Vegas, NV 89101 Sara Culley United States Dept. Of Justice P.O. Box 663 Washington, D.C. 20044-0663 DATED this ____day of April, 2005. ________________________ Tiffany Harnage

From: Executive Manager mailto:rcook@indiancountryactionnetwork.info

A Review of the Wisconsin Oneida Land Claim Settlement

This week we ponder the recent Supreme Court Ruling on City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of NY

Judicial activism defines high court's Oneida ruling
Indian Country Today March 31, 2005.
by: Editors Report / Indian Country Today

Judicial activism is alive and well in the U.S. Supreme Court. In a resounding 8 - 1 decision that underscored the severely anti-Indian property rights direction of the country, the court let it be known it would not countenance any ''remedy'' for Indian land claims that might ''seriously disrupt'' existing expectations of the non-Indian community.

With revenues from its tribal enterprises, the Oneida Nation has purchased some 17,000 acres within its ancestral reservation. The decision denies the Oneida Nation's right to place regained lands under tribal jurisdiction.

The City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of N.Y. case involved the Oneida Nation's attempt to purchase parcels of land presently within the city and place them within its own sovereign jurisdiction. The high court adjudicated that the loss of property tax revenue to the city constituted a ''serious disruption'' to the town and its people. The Oneida assertion of injury by the state was reaffirmed but the remedy was denied.

The land in question was lost more than 200 years ago, wrote Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg for the majority of the court; thus, ''Generations have passed during which non-Indians have owned and developed the area that once composed the tribe's historic reservation.'' Ginsburg cited the ''laches'' doctrine, which disallows cases brought to the courts on the basis of time lapsed, when she wrote, ''The Oneidas long ago relinquished the reins of government and cannot regain them through open-market purchases from current titleholders.''

The Ginsburg opinion holds that the tribal nation, one of the ''younger brothers'' in the Confederacy of the Six Nations or League of the Haudenosaunee, waited too long to reassert authority over the lost lands.

Of great interest and always primary in Indian law cases that reach the Supreme Court, the first note in the opinion refers to the Doctrine of Discovery as the basis of Indian law. This fundamental ''doctrine'' of conquest in American law simply decreed at the beginning of European conquest that in the Americas title to land ''discovered,'' regardless of those Indian nations in actual possession of it for hundreds if not thousands of years, would be vested in the first European nation that claimed it.

It is always worth perusing the fine print on all Indian nations' land cases to note the particular moment when the theft of land is justified and passes into law.

Note 1 in the current decision states: ''Under the 'doctrine of discovery,' County of Oneida v. Oneida Indian Nation of N.Y., 470 U.S. 226, 234 (1985) (Oneida II), 'fee title to the lands occupied by Indians when the colonists arrived became vested in the sovereign - first the discovering European nation and later the original states and the United States.'''

Despite the Doctrine of Discovery, tribal nations in fact retained ownership of lands and redeveloped self-governing jurisdictions over them. Memory and assertions of land recovery have been constant, though for most of two centuries disallowed from standing in American courts. Now, even two centuries later, descendants of the original and rightful landholders continue their quest to reacquire some significant portion of their national ancestral land bases. By and large, the land base in question has been put to good use and the economy of the region has benefited substantially by the traffic generated by Indian businesses.

The hope was for a just decision, leading to an Indian-led economic and cultural revival for a previously dormant area. However, again invoking the Doctrine of Discovery, the Supreme Court has decided that repurchased Indian land may not unilaterally revert to tribal aboriginal title status by uniting fee title with tribal sovereignty.

As per the so-called ''Discovery'' mandate, European Christian nations came, claimed and got jurisdiction over the land, unilaterally. But as Indian nations heroically survived, filed their own land claims and won, it appears the rules of the game have changed again and Indians can not now even buy the lands back into their own title and jurisdiction. Instead, this level of purchasing (17,000 acres in the counties of Oneida and Madison, representing less than 1.5 percent of the counties' total area), creating a theme destination entertainment center that presently employs some 4,200 people, is assumed to constitute a disruption of the local non-Native population.

As a result, a successful tribal enterprise stimulus, akin to the much-heralded ''enterprise zones,'' is itself disrupted by a clearly one-sided mindset bent on interpreting tribal sovereignty as negative for American society. Wrote Ginsberg: ''Today, we decline to project redress for the tribe into the present and future, thereby disrupting the governance of central New York's counties and towns.''

Perhaps predictably, the court pointed to a different route - trust status - for tribes reacquiring jurisdiction over ancestral lands: ''Congress has provided a mechanism for the acquisition of lands for tribal communities that takes account of the interests of others with stakes in the area's governance and well being. Title 25 U.S.C. / 465 authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to acquire land in trust for Indians and provides that the land 'shall be exempt from state and local taxation.'''

This type of ''activist'' jurisprudence by the Supreme Court, on a fundamental appeal to justice by an American Indian nation, is the clearest evidence that the high court is consistently a high risk for Indian nations seeking fundamental justice. This is perhaps the strongest lesson of this case, which was minutely well-researched and well-argued, legally succinct and irrefutable - but apparently wrong, severely wrong, for its times and for the contemporary mood throughout the American legal system.

In these gambling times, here is a dictum for Indian nations seeking justice: The house always wins. You may win a few good hands, perhaps quit while you are ahead, but in the end, the house always wins.

Just as importantly, the cacophony of voices and the most consistent messaging to reach the public channels available to high government offices are no doubt the highly organized lobbyists, from Indian nations' small business competitors to mayors, legislators and governors. These voices, rather than well-presented Indian tribal voices and positions, are much more audible to the high-level opinion leaders. Conflictive cases going to the high court always require millions of dollars, and all too often set in stone additional legal precedent to justify the loss of tribal rights.

Justice John Paul Stevens wrote a good dissenting opinion that points out the unwarranted judicial activism and overreach of the court in this case. Stevens declared that the court had essentially ''terminated the tribe's historic reservation and all rights associated with it.''

Wrote Stevens: ''Without the benefit of relevant briefing from the parties, the Court has ventured into legal territory that belongs to Congress. Its decision today is at war with at least two bedrock principles of Indian law. First, only Congress has the power to diminish or disestablish a tribe's reservation. Second, as a core incident of tribal sovereignty, a tribe enjoys immunity from state and local taxation of its reservation lands, until that immunity is explicitly revoked by Congress.

''Far from revoking this immunity, Congress has specifically reconfirmed it with respect to the reservation lands of the New York Indians. Ignoring these principles, the Court has done what only Congress may do - it has effectively proclaimed a diminishment of the tribe's reservation and an abrogation of its elemental right to tax immunity. Under our precedents, whether it is wise policy to honor the tribe's tax immunity is a question for Congress, not this Court, to decide.''

Stevens expresses dismay at the decision because ''the tribe reacquired reservation land in a peaceful and lawful manner that fully respected the interests of innocent landowners - it purchased the land on the open market. To now deny the tribe its right to tax immunity - at once the most fundamental of tribal rights and the least disruptive to other sovereigns - is not only inequitable, but also irreconcilable with the principle that only Congress may abrogate or extinguish tribal sovereignty.''

An appreciation is extended to Stevens for expressing the lone viewpoint of justice in this case. Would that eight more like him sat on the exalted bench.

Western Shoshone fills lawsuit to stop Yucca Mountain ...

• Press Release : March 4, 2005. Las Vegas, Nevada :
  Western Shoshone Nation Uses 1863 Treaty to Stop Yucca Mtn Nuclear Waste
    - formats: .doc , .pdf , .htm
• Complaint - formats: .wdp , .doc , .pdf
• Injunction - formats: .wdp , .doc , .pdf
• Video clip

• Indian Law Resource Center
  www.indianlaw.org
  
  
• Indigenous Peoples Law & Policy Program
  http://www.law.arizona.edu/depts/iplp/advocacy_clinical/western_shoshone.htm