United States v. Stearns Lumber Co
| Decision Date | 07 January 1918 |
| Docket Number | No. 94,94 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES v. J. S. STEARNS LUMBER CO |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Mr. Assistant Attorney General Kearful, for the United States.
Messrs. Arthur Dyrenforth and W. W. Gurley, both of Chicago, Ill., for appellee.
The United States brought its bill to cancel patents from the state of Wisconsin held by the J. S. Stearns Lumber Company and covering certain lands in the Bad River or La Pointe Indian Reservation in the state of Wisconsin. The District Court dismissed the bill for want of equity. There is no controversy as to the facts, and it appears that the Lake Superior Chippewas by treaty of October 4, 1842, proclaimed March 23, 1843 (7 Stat. 591), ceded large tracts of land in Wisconsin and Michigan to the United States, reserving the right of hunting on the ceded territory, and other usual privileges of occupancy until removed by the President. Within the Wisconsin territory were included the sections 16 in question, lying in township 46 north, ranges 2 and 3 west, and township 47 north, in range 2 west.
Wisconsin was admitted to the Union in 1848. The Enabling Act contained the provision as to the school sections recited in Wisconsin v. Lane, 245 U. S. 427, 38 Sup. Ct. 135, 62 L. Ed. ——, just decided. The President did not remove the Indians, and on September 30, 1854, a treaty was made with them, proclaimed January 29, 1855 (10 Stat. 1109), whereby the United States set apart the La Pointe Reservation in Wisconsin, and provided for surveys and allotments in severalty from time to time of such reserved lands in the discretion of the President.
This reservation embraces the land in controversy; nothing was said in the treaty about sections numbered 16. The sectional survey identifying sections 16 as to one of the townships was made in 1864; as to the other two in 1873. From 1881 to 1887 the state of Wisconsin, claiming to own these lands under its school land grant, patented them to various persons, under whom the lumber company claims title.
In 1907 allotment patents were issued by the President of the United States to the Indians in severalty under article 3 of the treaty of 1854, the allottees have since resided on the reservation, and claim the lands allotted and patented to them. The patents in each case contained a provision that the allottee and his heirs shall not sell, lease, or in any manner alienate the lands except with the consent of the President. From 1909 to 1912 timber on the lands in dispute, which had been damaged by fire, was cut for sale by...
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