Johnson v. United States
| Decision Date | 11 September 1922 |
| Docket Number | 5813,5814. |
| Citation | 283 F. 954 |
| Parties | JOHNSON v. UNITED STATES. CARSON v. SAME. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit |
Mark Goode, of Shawnee, Okl. (Charles E. Dierker, of Shawnee Okl., on the brief), for appellants.
John W Scothorn, Asst. U.S. Atty., of Oklahoma City, Okl. (W. A Maurer, U.S. atty., and Roy St. Lewis, Asst. U.S. Atty., both of Oklahoma City, Okl., on the brief), for the United States.
Before LEWIS and KENYON, Circuit Judges, and JOHNSON, District Judge.
The issues in these suits are alike; that is, whether deeds, some to Johnson and some to Carson, conveying lands in Oklahoma and executed by Indians, are valid conveyances. The final hearings were together on the facts admitted in the pleadings, other facts brought in by stipulation, brief testimony for appellants (defendants), and agreement that whatever was relevant and material to either case should be considered by the court in that case, although introduced in the other; and we can appropriately dispose of them here in one opinion. The suits were brought to quiet titles to the lands in the Indians, notwithstanding their deeds. The answers were in most part admissions, and also for affirmative relief. There is neither charge nor proof of fraud. The complaint in each case contains 27 counts, and each count deals with different tracts and deeds. The lands were all allotted under the act of February 8, 1887 (24 Stat. 388 (Comp. St. Sec. 4195 et seq.)), as amended by the act of March 3, 1891 (26 Stat. 989, 1019), and the trust period named in the act and shown in the respective certificates of allotments or trust patents had either not expired or had been extended, except as to one tract. In some instances conveyances were made by allottees of their allotments, but in most of them by heirs of the allottees; and some grantors who conveyed inherited interests were allottees of other tracts in their own right.
These facts brought under consideration by the court two statutes on which appellants relied, one as authorizing and validating some of the conveyances to each appellant, and the other statute as giving the same effect to other conveyances. We first take up the act of June 21, 1906 (34 Stat. 325, 363), the material part of which, for present consideration, reads thus:
'All restrictions as to sale and incumbrance of all lands, inherited and otherwise, of all adult Kickapoo Indians, and of all Shawnee, Delaware, Caddo, and Wichita Indians who have heretofore been or are now known as Indians of said tribes, affiliating with said Kickapoo Indians now or hereafter nonresident in the United States, who have been allotted land in Oklahoma or Indian Territory are hereby removed: Provided, that any such Indian allottee who is a nonresident of the United States may lease his allotment without restriction for a period not exceeding five years: Provided further, that the parent or the person next of kin having the care and custody of a minor allottee may lease the allotment of said minor as herein provided, except that no such lease shall extend beyond the minority of said allottee.'
The trial court held that the act was ineffective to remove restrictions on alienation because, in that respect, it was inconsistent with the proviso immediately following; and that is the contention of appellee here. We cannot agree with that conclusion. It is a general rule that the meaning and legislative purpose of an act are to be found in its purview or the body of the act, and that this cannot be nullified and stricken by provisos and exceptions unless they are mutually destructive or so contradictory that they cannot be reconciled and made to stand together under any reasonable construction or interpretation that may be given it. The purview discloses plainly and clearly a legislative intention to remove restrictions under given conditions; and we find no difficulty in sustaining both, whether the provisos be taken in the technical sense as limiting the removal of...
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Bordeaux v. Hunt
...to impose, extend, or reimpose restrictions on property of an Indian ward is plenary and not open to doubt."); Johnson v. United States, 283 F. 954, 955 (8th Cir.1922) ("The purview discloses plainly and clearly a legislative intention to remove restrictions under given conditions; and we f......
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...convey disqualifies the heir as well as the immediate allottee." Aaron et al. v. United States (C. C. A. 8) 204 F. 943; Johnson v. United States (C. C. A. 8) 283 F. 954; Goodrum v. Buffalo (C. C. A. 8) 162 F. 817-823; Bowling v. United States (C. C. A. 8) 191 F. 19, affirmed 233 U. S. 528, ......
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Spriggs v. United States, 6711.
...659, 58 L.Ed. 1080; United States v. Gilbertson, 7 Cir., 111 F.2d 978; United States v. Kilgore, 10 Cir., 111 F. 2d 665; Johnson v. United States, 8 Cir., 283 F. 954. See Mullen v. United States, 224 U.S. 448, 32 S.Ct. 494, 56 L.Ed. 834. It is equally clear that when an Indian to whom a tru......
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