Seminole Nation v. United States

• Decision Date: 11 May 1942
• Docket Number: No. 830,830
• Citation: 62 S.Ct. 1061,316 U.S. 310,86 L.Ed. 1497
• Parties: SEMINOLE NATION v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

316 U.S. 310

62 S.Ct. 1061

86 L.Ed. 1497

SEMINOLE NATION

v UNITED STATES.

No. 830.

Argued April 2, 1942.

Decided May 11, 1942.

As Amended May 25, 1942.

Messrs. C. Maurice Weidemeyer and Paul M. Niebell, both of Washington, D.C., for petitioner.

Mr. Charles R. Denny, Jr., of Washington, D.C., for respondent.

Mr. Justice MURPHY delivered the opinion of the Court.

The question presented for decision is whether the United States remains under any obligation to the Seminole Nation with respect to Article III of the Treaty of March 21, 1866, 14 Stat. 755, 756, which provides in part: '* * * The United States having obtained by grant of the Creek nation the westerly half of their lands, hereby grant to the Seminole nation the portion thereof hereafter described, which shall constitute the national domain of the Seminole Indians. Said lands so granted by the United States to the Seminole nation are bounded and described as follows, to wit: Beginning on the Canadian river where the line dividing the Creek lands according to the terms of their sale to the United States by their treaty of February 6, 1866, following said line due north to where said line crosses the north fork of the Canadian river; thence up said north fork of the Canadian river a distance sufficient to make two hundred thousand acres by running due south to the Canadian river; thence down said Canadian river to the place of beginning. In consideration of said cession of two hundred thousand acres of land described above, the Seminole nation agrees to pay therefor the price of fifty cents per acre, amounting to the sum of one hundred thousand dollars, * * *.'

Petitioner's claim is for just compensation for the alleged taking by the United States of an asserted deficiency in the tract granted by this Article.

Late in 1866, before the boundaries of the Seminole domain had been located, the Seminoles moved to what was assumed to be their treaty land.¹ The first survey of the line dividing the Creek and the Seminole territories, made by one Rankin, in 1868, under a contract with the Superintendent of Indian Affairs, was not approved by the Department of the Interior. In 1871 one Bardwell re-serveyed the dividing line and placed it seven miles west of the Rankin line. Two months later, at the direction of the Government, one Robbins ran the western boundary of the Seminole lands so as to include 200,000 acres from the Bardwell line. According to Robbins' calculations 200,000.03 acres were included between the Canadian river on the south, the north fork of the Canadian river on the north, the Bardwell line on the east and the Robbins line on the west. The Bardwell and Robbins surveys were both approved by the Secretary of the Interior on February 5, 1872.

Meanwhile, pursuant to Article I of the Treaty of February 27, 1867, 15 Stat. 531,² the Pottawatomie tribe selected a tract bounded 'by the West line of the Seminole lands', and on November 9, 1870, the Secretary of the Interior approved that selection. In 1872, after the location of the Robbins line, the Pottawatomies occupied the territory immediately west of that line. Subsequently, the Government allotted and patented the lands west of the Robbins line to the Pottawatomies in severalty, or sold and patented them to settlers and turned the purchase price into the Treasury as public money.³

The Bardwell survey disclosed that a considerable area east of the Seminole-Creek dividing line had been occupied by the Seminoles, who had made substantial improvements on this land. In order that the Seminoles might retain the lands which they had improved, Congress authorized negotiations for the purchase of these lands east of the Bardwell line. Act of March 3, 1873, 17 Stat. 626. An agreement was entered into on February 14, 1881, with the Creek Nation whereby that Nation ceded land east of the Bardwell line to the United States, the agreement providing that the eastern boundary of the land ceded was to be drawn so that the tract would aggregate 175,000 acres. Creek Nation v. United States, 93 Ct.Cl. 561, 566. The Creeks received $175,000 for this tract. Act of August 5, 1882, 22 Stat. 257, 265. This land became a part of the Seminole domain and was disposed of either by allotment to members of the tribe or by sale for the account of the tribe.

The possibility of a deficiency in the original 200,000 acre tract was first suspected in 1900.⁴ By an amended petition filed in the Court of Claims in 1937⁵ the Seminole Nation alleged that owing to an error in the location of the Robbins line, the territory enclosed between the Robbins and Bardwell lines was 11,550.54 acres short of 200,000 acres, and that the United States took from the Seminoles 11,550.54 acres west of the Robbins line when the Government patented that land to individuals in 1892 and subsequent years. Judgment was prayed against the United States for value at the time of taking of the 11,550.54 acres, with interest at the rate of five percent per annum. The Court of Claims made no finding as to whether a shortage in fact existed in the tract between the Bardwell and Robbins lines but held that in any event the Seminole Nation was more than compensated for the alleged shortage by the Government's purchase for the Seminoles of 175,000 acres of land from the Creek Nation. The court also stated that even if petitioner were entitled to recover for any deficit in the 200,000 acre tract, the Government would be entitled to offset the value of the 175,000 acre tract as a gratuitous expenditure under the Act of August 12, 1935, 49 Stat. 571, 596, a value assumed to be far in excess of the value of whatever deficit there may have been. We granted certiorari, 315 U.S. 791, 62 S.Ct. 639, 86 L.Ed. —-, because of the close connection between this case and Seminole Nation v. United States, 316 U.S. 286, 62 S.Ct. 1049, 86 L.Ed. —-, No. 348 this Term, decided today.⁶

The judgment of the Court of Claims cannot be sustained on either of the grounds advanced. The Government in this Court agrees to this proposition and suggests that the cause be remanded to the Court of Claims.

I.

Underlying the denial of recovery for any deficit in the 200,000 acre tract because petitioner was compensated therefor 'fifteen-fold'...