 Marshall then addressed the Commerce Clause issues , and the argument of the Solicitor General that the section of the Commerce Clause that dealt directly with Indians applied rather than the argument of the oil companies that the section dealing with interstate commerce applied . First , Marshall noted that the case history of the Indian Commerce Clause was to protect the tribes from state infringement , not to approve of Indian trade without constitutional restraint . He saw of no reason to begin now , especially since he did not find that the tribe 's severance tax did not have negative implications on interstate commerce . In a 6 @-@ 3 decision , Marshall found that the tribe had the right to impose such a tax on non @-@ Indians . 
