James F. Byrnes

“ It urges that instead we are called upon to determine whether the President had the power to bestow upon the Sioux Tribe an interest in these lands of such a character as to require compensation when the interest was extinguished by the executive orders of 1879 and 1884. Concededly, where lands have been reserved for the use and occupation of an Indian Tribe by the terms of a treaty or statute, the tribe must be compensated if the lands are subsequently United States, 299 U.S. 476, 57 S.Ct. ”

“ It is true that on several of the many occasions when Congress itself abolished executive order reservations, it provided for a measure of compensation to the Indians. In the Act of July 1, 1892, restoring to the public domain a large portion of the Colville reservation and in the Act of February 20, 1893 restoring a portion of the White Mountain Apache Indian Reservation, Congress directed that the proceeds
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it is a work of the United States federal government (see 17 U.S.C. 105) . ”

“ We conclude therefore that there was no express constitutional or statutory authorization for the conveyance of a compensable interest to petitioner by the four executive orders of 1875 and 1876, and that no implied Congressional delegation of the power to do so can be spelled out from the evidence of Congressional and executive understanding. ”

“ Since the lands involved in the case before us were never allotted indeed, the executive orders of 1879 and 1884 terminated the reservation even before the Allotment Act was passed,-we think the Act has no bearing upon the issue presented. from the sale of the lands be used for the benefit of the Indians. ”