Pueblo of Santa Rosa v. Fall
| Decision Date | 21 February 1927 |
| Docket Number | No. 511,511 |
| Citation | 273 U.S. 315,71 L.Ed. 658,47 S.Ct. 361 |
| Parties | PUEBLO OF SANTA ROSA v. FALL, Secretary of the Interior, et al |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Messrs. W. C. Reid, of Albuquerque, N. M., H. P. Hibbard and Louis Kleindienst, both of Los Angeles, Cal., and Levi H. David, of Washington, D. C., for petitioner.
The Attorney General and Mr. Solicitor General Mitchell, of Washington, D. C., for respondents.
Our order granting the writ of certiorari in this case directed a hearing on the issue as to the existence of authority of counsel who filed the bill to represent complainant. That hearing now has been had.
The suit is brought to enjoin respondents from offering, listing or disposing of certain lands in Arizona as public lands of the United States. The case was here before on appeal (Lane v. Pueblo of Santa Rosa, 249 U. S. 110, 39 S. Ct. 185, 63 L. Ed. 504), and was remanded to the District Supreme Court, with directions to overrule a motion to dismiss on the merits and allow defendants to answer the bill. After receipt of the mandate, an answer was filed denying the allegations of the bill and alleging, among other things, that the so-called pueblo had never authorized the suit or ratified or approved the acts of the attorneys in bringing or prosecuting it; and upon that ground, a motion to dismiss, supported by affidavits, was filed at the same time. After a hearing upon the motion, the trial court postponed a decision until final hearing; and the taking of testimony was proceeded with, much of it relating to was issue now before this court.
The record is a long one, but the pertinent facts may be shortly stated. About the year 1880, deeds were drawn and acknowledged by a number of Indians, conveying to one Hunter, as trustee, an interest in the lands, grants, and privileges of certain named villages. Among these deeds was one which purported to be made by 'Luis, captain of the village or pueblo of Santa Rosa,' for himself and inhabitants of that village and others, and to convey an undivided half interest in 720 square miles of land. At the same time, powers of attorney were executed by the various grantors. The only one with which we are here concerned is that given by Luis, the terms of which, we assume for present purposes, were sufficient to authorize Hunter to bring and maintain an suit like the present. It granted to Hunter powers of delegation, substitution, and revocation, and recited that, as it was 'accompanied with an interest, * * * it is hereby made irrevocable.' While Hunter was authorized to render services in establishing the claim of the Indians to the lands, it does not appear that he agreed to do so unless by implication merely; nor does it appear that there was any other consideration for the conveyance.
In 1911, Hunter entered into contracts with one Martin, by which the latter was to undertake to establish the Indian title and make certain cash payments in consideration of the conveyance to him of an undivided three-fourths interest in the lands which would fall to Hunter upon a partition between himself and the Indians. The same year, and long after the death of Luis, Hunter executed a delegation of his powers to one Cates. Hunter died in 1912, and this suit was brought in 1914 by a firm of lawyers of which Cates was a member. Cates died in 1920, several years before the motion to dismiss was heard in the court of first instance.
The Luis deed was not recorded in the counties where the lands are situated until 34 years after its execution and 2 years after the death of Hunter, the grantee. The delay is not explained. Careful and comprehensive inquiries, conducted among the Indians over a period of several years, failed to disclose any one who knew of any authority from the Indians to bring or maintain the suit. Among them were contemporaries of Luis, but none had ever heard of the deed or the power; and it is made clear that these instruments properly could not have been executed or any interest of the Indians conveyed without previous deliberation for that purpose on the part of the Indians in council, and that no such council was ever assembled. The evidence further shows that no suit properly could have been brought without the prior consent of the Indians in council, and that no council for that purpose was ever assembled. The attitude of the government seems to have been that the lands claimed are public lands, subject only to the ordinary right of Indian occupancy.
Early in the year 1922, after consideration, 181 of the 195 adult male inhabitants of the villages said to form the pueblo of Santa Rosa signed a petition declaring that none of them knew about the suit until after it was brought or gave any one a right to bring it, and that none of them approves of it, or wants it to go on, and requesting 'that this suit, which we do not want, and with which we have nothing to do, be dismissed.'
The court of first instance, assuming, without deciding, that the plaintiff was a pueblo as set forth in the bill and owned the lands...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Booth v. Fletcher
...both supra note 23; In re Illinois Fireworks & Display Co., D.C.E.D.Ill., 4 F. Supp. 200, 202. 26 Pueblo of Santa Rosa v. Fall, 273 U.S. 315, 319, 47 S.Ct. 361, 362, 71 L. Ed. 658; Sutherland v. International Ins. Co., 2 Cir., 43 F.2d 969, certiorari denied 282 U.S. 890, 51 S.Ct. 103, 75 L.......
-
Indians v. United States
...paper title to the lands. Pueblo of Santa Rosa v. Fall, 56 App.D.C. 259, 262, 12 F.2d 332, 335, reversed on other grounds, 273 U.S. 315, 47 S.Ct. 361, 71 L.Ed. 658. Disputes as to the Indian titles in the Pueblos and their position as wards required congressional action for settlement. See ......
-
Golden Hill Paugussett Tribe of Indians v. Town of Southbury
...Supreme Court, in a case strikingly similar to the case at bar, more than seventy years ago. In Pueblo of Santa Rosa v. Fall, 273 U.S. 315, 317, 47 S.Ct. 361, 361, 71 L.Ed. 658 (1927), as in this case, a suit had been filed in the name of an Indian tribe pursuant to a power of attorney exec......
-
F. PALICIO y COMPANIA, SA v. Brush, 61 Civ. 2299.
...has inherent power to make inquiry as to the authority of an attorney to represent a litigant. E. g., Pueblo of Santa Rosa v. Fall, 273 U.S. 315, 47 S.Ct. 361, 71 L.Ed. 658 (1927); In re Retail Chemists Corp., 66 F.2d 605 (2 Cir. 1933); Sutherland v. International Ins. Co., 43 F.2d 969 (2 C......
-
Rule of Professional Conduct 1.14 and the Diminished-capacity Client
...v. Ayers, 955 P.2d 78, 82 (Colo.App. 1998) (decided under a prior version of the Colorado Probate Code). 17. Pueblo of Santa Rosa v. Fall, 273 U.S. 315, 319 (1927) (stating that a court always has the power to require an attorney before it to demonstrate his or her authority to appear); Mil......