Ray Jones v. Patrick Meehan
| Decision Date | 30 October 1899 |
| Docket Number | No. 7,7 |
| Citation | 175 U.S. 1,44 L.Ed. 49,20 S.Ct. 1 |
| Parties | RAY W. JONES, Appt. , v. PATRICK MEEHAN and James Meehan |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Mr. James A. Kellogg for appellant.
Messrs. C. K. Davis, Frank B. Kellogg, and C. A. Severance for appellees.
This was a bill in equity, filed in the circuit court of the United States for the district of Minnesota by Patrick Meehan and James Meehan, citizens of Wisconsin, against Ray W. Jones, a citizen of Minnesota, to quiet title in a strip of land 10 feet wide along the westerly shore of the Red Lake river, in the county of Polk and state of Minnesota, extending from the northeasterly intersection of the plat of the village of Thief River Falls with the shore at a point near the junction of the two rivers, and being a part of lot 1 in section 34, township 154, and range 43.
For convenience the parties will be designated, throughout this opinion, according to their position in the court below; the Meehans, now appellees, as the plaintiffs; and Jones, now appellant, as the defendant.
Each party derived title under the 'reservation of six hundred and forty acres near the mouth of the Thief river for the chief Moose Dung,' in article 9 of the treaty made at the Old Crossing of Red Lake river in the state of Minnesota, on October 2, 1863, between the United States, by their commissioners, Alexander Ramsey, a senator of the United States for the state of Minnesota, and Ashley C. Morrill, agent for the Chippewa Indians, of the one part, and the Red Lake and Pembina bands of Chippewa Indians, by their chiefs, headmen, and warriors, of the other part, and afterwards ratified by the Senate, with amendments assented to by the Indians. 13 Stat. at L. 667-671. The material provisions of that treaty were as follows:
By article 2 those bands of Chippewas ceded to the United States all their right, title, and interest in a large tract of country to the west of Thief river in the state of Minnesota, including all the American valley of the Red River of the North.
By article 3: 'In consideration of the foregoing cession, the United States agree to pay to the said Red Lake and Pembina bands of Chippewa Indians the following sums, to wit: Twenty thousand dollars per annum for twenty years; the said sum to be distributed among the Chippewa Indians of the said bands in equal amounts per capita.'
By article 5:
By article 8: 'In further consideration of the foregoing cession, it is hereby agreed that the United States shall grant to each male adult half-breed or mixed blood who is related by blood to the said Chippewas of the said Red Lake or Pembina bands, who has adopted the habits and customs of civilized life, and who is a citizen of the United States, a homestead of one hundred and sixty acres of land, to be selected at his option, within the limits of the tract of country hereby ceded to the United States, on any land not previously occupied by actual settlers or covered by prior grants, the boundaries thereof to be adjusted in conformity with the lines of the official surveys when the same shall be made, and with the laws and regulations of the United States affecting the location and entry of the same.'
By one of the amendments made by the Senate, with the assent of the Indians, there was inserted at the end of article 8 the following: 'Provided, that no scrip shall be issued under the provisions of this article, and no assignments shall be made of any right, title, or interest at law or in equity until a patent shall issue, adn no patent shall be issued until due proof of five years' actual residence and cultivation, as required by the act entitled 'An Act to Secure Homesteads on the Public Domain.'
By article 9 of the treaty: 'Upon the urgent request of the Indians, parties to this treaty, there shall be set apart from the tract hereby ceded a reservation of six hundred and forty acres near the mouth of Thief river for the chief Moose Dung, and a like reservation of six hundred and forty acres for the chief Red Bear on the north side of Pembina river.'
Moose Dung or Monsimoh was one of the principal chiefs of the Red Lake band of Chippewa Indians, and his name was the first of the Indian signatures to the treaty, all of which were by marks only.
The plaintiffs, against the defendant's objection, introduced in evidence certified copies of extracts from the journal of the proceedings at the negotiation of the treaty, annexed to the report made by Mr. Ramsey to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs in October, 1863. That journal stated that 'Moose Dung, who was really the most influential of all the chiefs, stood at the head of a party embracing the large majority of all the bands who were favorable to and even anxious for a treaty.' It also showed that part of the discussion was as follows: Moose Dung said: Mr. Ramsey answered, Moose Dung replied, The journal further stated that 'at the end of a session of three and a half hours' duration Moose Dung, who has stood for an hour weighing and deliberating on every separate provision of this treaty, asking for this explanation and that modification, appearing to labor under a serious sense of the great responsibility he was taking, at last touched the pen which was to affix his vicarious signmanual to the treaty,' and the other chiefs followed his example.
The plaintiffs also, against the like objection, introduced testimony of the secretary of the commission, of the official interpreter and of other persons, Indians as well as white persons, who were present at the negotiation of the treaty, to the same effect.
Moose Dung selected as his reservation, under the ninth article of the treaty, six hundred and forty acres, a part of which was lot 1 in section 34, including the strip now in controversy; and he lived on that land at the mounth of Thief river, and made it his home, and had a log house, a garden, and a fish trap there. He died in 1872, before the lands were surveyed, and was succeeded as chief by his eldest son, who had been born at Red Lake in 1828, and who was known to the whites by the same name of Moose Dung or Monsimoh, and to the Indians as Mayskokonoyay, meaning 'The one that wears the red robes;' and, ever since the making of the treaty, his father and himself, in succession, sustained tribal relations with the Red Lake band of Chippewa Indians, and that band continued to be recognized as an Indian tribe by the government of the United States.
On June 27, 1879, the United States Indian agent at White Earth, Minnesota, wrote to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs at Washington that Moose Dung the younger, the only surviving son of Moose Dung named in the treaty, requested that the land selected by his father might be set aside for his benefit. On July 25, 1879, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs answered that Moose Dung the younger should at once locate the desired lands in accordance with the description in the treaty; and that it must be shown to the satisfaction of the Office of Indian Affairs that his father left no other children. On September 10, 1879, the agent replied that 'the heirs of Moose Dung' had selected the lands (describing them particularly) that had been selected by the elder Moose Dung before his death. On September 30, 1879, the Secretary of the Interior, on the recommendation of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, approved 'the selection made by the heirs of Moose Dung,' and directed the Commissioner of the General Land Office to 'take the necessary steps for the protection of the said lands so reserved for the benefit of those entitled, as contemplated by the treaty stipulations;' and they were thereupon set apart accordingly, and were designated on all government maps as 'Moose Dung's reservation.'
From the time of this selection Moose Dung the younger lived upon, exercised dominion over, and claimed to own, the land so selected, and cultivated part of it, leased other parts of it for pasturage, and sold sand off it.
On November 7, 1891, Moose Dung the younger, describing himself as 'Moose Dung, of Thief River Falls, Polk county, Minnesota,' made a lease to the plaintiffs, for ten years, at an annual rent of twenty-five dollars, of this strip of land and all shore rights for storing logs, erecting piles and booms, and for all purposes connected with lumbering; and he affixed to it his mark and seal, and acknowledged it before a notary public after its contents had been fully explained to him through an interpreter. On November 10, 1891, this...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Sei Fujii v. State
...Foster v. Neilson, 2 Pet. 253, 310-316, 7 L.Ed. 415; United States v. Percheman, 7 Pet. 51, 58-59, 8 L.Ed. 604; Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 10-23, 20 S.Ct. 1, 5-10, 44 L.Ed. 49; Chew Heong v. United States, 112 U.S. 536, 539-543, 5 S.Ct. 255, 256-258, 28 L.Ed. 770; Cook v. United States, 2......
-
Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians v. Voigt
...by this unlettered people, rather than their critical meaning, should form the rule of construction. In Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 11, 20 S.Ct. 1, 5, 44 L.Ed. 49 (1899), the Court stated that a "treaty must therefore be construed, not according to the technical meaning of its words to lea......
-
Santa Clara Pueblo v. Martinez
...law in internal matters, see Roff v. Burney, 168 U.S. 218, 18 S.Ct. 60, 42 L.Ed. 442 (1897) (mem- bership)s Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 29, 20 S.Ct. 1, 12, 44 L.Ed. 49 (1899) (inheritance rules); United States v. Quiver, 241 U.S. 602, 36 S.Ct. 699, 60 L.Ed. 1176 (1916) (domestic relations)......
-
Northwestern Bands of Shoshone Indians v. United States v. 10 8212 13, 1944
...and its recognition by the United States could hardly have been plainer. We should remember the admonition in Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 11, 20 S.Ct. 1, 5, 44 L.Ed. 49, that in construing a treaty between the United States and an Indian tribe it must always be borne in mind 'that the nego......
-
Native Treaties and Conditional Rights After Herrera.
...of the terms in which the treaty is framed is that imparted to them by the interpreter employed by the United States.... Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 10-11 (47.) See generally Bryan H. Wildenthal, Indian Sovereignty, General Federal Laws, and the Canons of Construction: An Overview and Upda......
-
Table of Cases
...L. Ed. 2d 530 (1967): 4.4(1), 4.16(1)(b) Jackman v. Rosenbaum Co., 260 U.S. 22, 43 S. Ct. 9, 67 L. Ed. 107 (1922): 2.3(1) Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 20 S. Ct. 1, 44 L. Ed. 49 (1899): 5.14 Kerr-McGee Corp. v. Navajo Tribe, 471 U.S. 195, 105 S. Ct. 1900, 85 L. Ed. 2d 200 (1985): 5.4(2), 5.1......
-
Table of Cases
...252 U.S. 189, 40 S.Ct. 189, 64 L. Ed. 521: 177 Free v. Bland, 369 U.S. 663, 82 S.Ct. 1089, 8 L.Ed.2d 180 (1962): 357 Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 20 S.Ct. 1, 44 L. Ed. 49 (1899): 438 Mullane v. Cent. Hanover Bank & Tr. Co., 339 U.S. 306, 70 S.Ct. 652, 94 L. Ed. 865 (1950): 414 Scott v. McNe......
-
Table of Cases
...49 S.Ct. 291, 73 L. Ed. 647 (1929): 12.14(1)(b) Johnson v. M'Intosh, 21 U.S. (8 Wheat.) 543, 5 L. Ed. 681 (1823): 14.1(1) Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 20 S.Ct. 1, 44 L. Ed. 49 (1899): 14.2(3) Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 123 S.Ct. 2472, 156 L.Ed.2d 508 (2003): 17.4(8) McKay v. Kalyton, ......