Title: Oliphant v. Suquamish Indian Tribe - Wikipedia
Headings: Oliphant v. Suquamish Indian Tribe
Oliphant v. Suquamish Indian Tribe
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Contents
Background
Procedural history
Ruling
Dissenting opinion
Effects
Evolution
See also
References
Further reading
External links

Content: Contents
1 Background
2 Procedural history
3 Ruling
4 Dissenting opinion
5 Effects
6 Evolution
7 See also
8 References
9 Further reading
10 External links
Background
In August 1973 Mark David Oliphant, a non-Indian living as a permanent resident with the Suquamish Tribe on the Port Madison Indian Reservation in northwestern Washington, was arrested and charged by tribal police with assaulting a tribal officer and resisting arrest during the Suquamish Tribe's Chief Seattle Days. Knowing that thousands of people would gather in a small area for the celebration, the tribe requested Kitsap County and the Bureau of Indian Affairs for additional law enforcement assistance. The county sent just one deputy, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs sent no one. When Oliphant was arrested, at 4:30 a.m., only tribal officers were on duty. Oliphant applied for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court and claimed he was not subject to tribal authority because he was not Native American. He challenged the exercise of criminal jurisdiction by the tribe over non-Indians. Procedural history
Oliphant's application for a writ of habeas corpus was rejected by the lower courts. The Ninth Circuit upheld tribal criminal jurisdiction over non-Indians on Indian land because the ability to keep law and order on tribal lands was an important attribute of tribal sovereignty that had been neither surrendered by treaty nor removed by the US Congress under its plenary power over Tribes. Judge Anthony Kennedy, then a judge of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, dissented from the decision and said he found no support for the idea that only treaties and acts of Congress could take away the retained rights of tribes. He considered that doctrine of tribal sovereignty was not "analytically helpful" in resolving the issue.