Short v. U.S., 102-63

• Decision Date: 06 October 1983
• Docket Number: No. 102-63,102-63
• Citation: 719 F.2d 1133
• Parties: Jessie SHORT, et al., Appellants, v. The UNITED STATES, Cross-Appellant and Appellee, and Hoopa Valley Tribe, Cross-Appellant and Appellee. Appeal
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Federal Circuit

Page 1133

719 F.2d 1133

Jessie SHORT, et al., Appellants, v. The UNITED STATES, Cross-Appellant and Appellee and Hoopa Valley Tribe, Cross-Appellant and Appellee.

Appeal No. 102-63.

United States Court of Appeals Federal Circuit.

Oct. 6, 1983.

William C. Wunsch, Weyman I. Lundquist and William K. Shearer, San Diego, Cal., argued for appellants.

Thomas P. Schlosser, Seattle, Wash., argued for intervenor Hoopa Valley Indian Tribe.

James Earl Brookshire, U.S. Dept. of Justice, Washington, D.C., argued for appellee, United States.

Before RICH, DAVIS, BENNETT, SMITH and NIES, Circuit Judges.

DAVIS, Circuit Judge.

This ancient case (commenced against the Government in the Court of Claims some two decades ago) comes once again for appellate scrutiny. Ten years ago, in 486 F.2d 561, 202 Ct.Cl. 870 (1973), cert. denied, 416 U.S. 961, 94 S.Ct. 1981, 40 L.Ed.2d 313, the Court of Claims decided that the Hoopa Valley Reservation was one reservation all of whose Indian peoples (including, in general, non-Hoopa Indians residing on or connected with the reservation) were "Indians of the Reservation" entitled to equal rights in the division of timber profits (and other income) from the unallotted trust land of the reservation, and therefore that the United States had wrongfully paid those profits exclusively to the members of the Shortly before and at the oral argument of this appeal, the United States and the Hoopa Valley Tribe raised again the issue of the jurisdiction of the Court of Claims (and, now, of the Claims Court) over the entire suit. Though the question of the court's jurisdiction had been previously raised (and jurisdiction sustained) on a number of occasions, the new challenge was on grounds not before articulated (though the assault was one that could readily have been presented much earlier). We allowed the Government and the Hoopa Valley Tribe to file motions to dismiss on the new basis, and those motions have been extensively briefed. We withheld decision on the appeal until the Supreme Court had decided United States v. Mitchell, U.S.Sup.Ct., Oct. Term 1982, No. 81-1748 (Mitchell II ). That decision was rendered on June 27, 1983 (--- U.S. ----, 103 S.Ct. 2961, 77 L.Ed.2d 580), and we then allowed the parties to brief the impact on the present case of the Supreme Court's recent opinion and ruling. We are now ready to dispose of the current appeal.

                Hoopa Valley Tribe. 1   In 209 Ct.Cl. 777 (1976), the court allowed interventions by new plaintiffs and closed the class of plaintiffs (now amounting to some 3800).  In 661 F.2d 150, 228 Ct.Cl. 535 (1981), cert. denied, 455 U.S. 1034, 102 S.Ct. 1738, 72 L.Ed.2d 153 (1982), the court denied new motions to dismiss and to substitute the Yurok Tribe as plaintiff, and directed the trial judge to recommend standards for the qualification of the approximately 3800 remaining plaintiffs as Indians of the Hoopa Valley Reservation entitled to share in the income of the Reservation.  On March 31, 1982, then Trial Judge Schwartz, who had long handled the case at the trial level, issued his opinion on that subject.  In that decision, he established standards for qualifying the various plaintiffs and granted and denied the plaintiffs' motions for summary judgment in accordance with those standards.  All parties appeal from that decision which is now before us. 2
                

In Part I of this opinion, infra, we discuss the new challenge to jurisdiction and reject it, especially in the light of Mitchell II. In Part II, infra, we consider the merits of Judge Schwartz's standards and affirm them, as well as his conclusions of law.

I. Jurisdiction

This is an action for monies said to have been illegally distributed to members of the Hoopa Valley Tribe, without any share going to those of the plaintiffs who qualify as Indians of the Hoopa Valley Reservation. The details are set forth in the Court of Claims' decisions reported at 486 F.2d 561 and 661 F.2d 150. The current jurisdictional attack ³ is that Congress has not waived sovereign immunity for the suit and in any event that plaintiffs have no substantive claim for money from the United States (even if their allegations and substantive positions are sustained, as they have been).

A.

In Mitchell II, the Supreme Court upheld jurisdiction in the Court of Claims (and, now, in the Claims Court) of a suit by Indian plaintiffs for damages for breach of fiduciary duties by the Government. On the jurisdictional issue now before us, the current case is essentially governed by that recent decision. Just like Mitchell II, this litigation concerns Indian-owned forest lands on an Indian reservation (there, the Quinault Reservation in Washington; here, the Hoopa Valley Reservation in California), with these forest resources being managed

                by the Department of the Interior which exercises "comprehensive" control over the harvesting of the Indian timber.  See Part III of the Supreme Court's opinion in Mitchell II, --- U.S. at ----, 103 S.Ct. at 2969-2974;  also see --- U.S. at ----, 103 S.Ct. at 2965-2966.  The "broad" statutory authority of the Secretary of the Interior over the sale and management of the timber on the two reservations is precisely the same, i.e., 25 U.S.C. Secs. 405-406.  In Mitchell, those plaintiffs claimed breach by the Government of fiduciary duties in the management and sale of the timber;  here, plaintiffs likewise claim breach of such fiduciary duty.  The difference is that in Mitchell II the alleged injury had to do with such things as the price obtained for the timber, failure to manage on a sustained yield basis, and exacting improper fees and charges--here the injury is the discriminatory distribution of the proceeds of the timber sales and management (and other Reservation income).  The Supreme Court expressly held that the statutes and regulations relating to the management of Indian timber, see primarily 25 U.S.C. Secs. 405-407, established a fiduciary relationship with respect to the timber, and because they clearly established such "fiduciary obligations of the Government in the management and operation of Indian land and resources, they can fairly be interpreted as mandating compensation by the Federal Government for damages sustained.  Given the existence of a trust relationship, it naturally follows that the Government should be liable in damages for the breach of its fiduciary duties."    --- U.S. at ---- - ----, especially ----, 103 S.Ct. at 2971-2973, especially 2972.  It must also follow that the Government was under fiduciary obligations with respect to the comparable Indian forest lands involved here, and is liable for breach of fiduciary obligation in failing to distribute the sale proceeds (and other income) to persons entitled to share in those proceeds--such as those plaintiffs who turn out to be qualified in this case
                

B.

The contentions of the Government and of the Hoopa Valley Tribe (on the matters discussed in this Part I) that have survived Mitchell II ⁴ all lack merit. First, it is conceded that Mitchell II destroys the argument that there has been no waiver of sovereign immunity. The Supreme Court ruled, overriding prior intimations to the contrary, that the Tucker Act is the only necessary consent to suit where statutes and regulations create substantive rights to money damages against the United States. --- U.S. at ----, 103 S.Ct. at 2969. "If a claim falls within this category, the existence of a waiver of sovereign immunity is clear" and the statutes or regulations founding the claim "need not provide a second waiver of sovereign immunity." Id. The opinion went on to declare that, in determining whether statutes or regulations create substantive rights to money, the court need not construe them "in the manner appropriate to waivers of sovereign immunity." Id.

The remaining issue (for this Part I) is whether there are statutes or regulations creating substantive rights to money. As we have said supra, Mitchell II specifically held that the forest management laws and regulations (which likewise pertain to this case) do create such substantive rights to money. The Government and the Hoopa Valley Tribe now try to distinguish Mitchell II by saying that that case involved only allotted lands, while the present litigation concerns unallotted lands. The former are dealt with in 25 U.S.C. Sec. 406 and the latter in 25 U.S.C. Sec. 407. But the Supreme Court's whole opinion consistently treats together both sections (and the regulations under them) in ruling that the statutory scheme creates a fiduciary duty toward the Indians entitled to the proceeds of the forest. See --- U.S. AT ----, ----, ---- - ----, ---- - ----, 103 s.ct. at 2963-2964, 2964-2965, 2969-2971, 2971-2974. The Both movants (the Government and the Hoopa Valley Tribe) also make much of the fact that the Act of April 8, 1864, 13 Stat. 39, which authorized the establishment of the Hoopa Valley Reservation and on which the Court of Claims primarily based its determination that qualified plaintiffs were entitled to share in the disputed monies (although they were not members of the Hoopa Valley Tribe), did not contain any authorization to the Government to sell or manage timber or empower the Government to distribute the proceeds. That may be true but it is irrelevant to the jurisdictional point before us. When this action was begun in 1963, the timber management legislation (mainly 25 U.S.C. Secs. 405-407) and the regulations thereunder, which do sustain jurisdiction, had long been on the books ⁶ and covered all the monies claimed in the suit (which do not go back beyond the six years prior to the commencement of the action in 1963). The function of the 1864 statute is to help show that the Government had a fiduciary relationship toward qualified plaintiffs with respect to the Hoopa Valley Reservation and also to show that the Secretary's action in excluding all but members of the Hoopa Valley Tribe from the distribution of...