AG's plan worth a look
Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter is proposing a plan to deal with the legal fallout from a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision regarding tribal sovereignty. Where this goes is unknown, but the idea certainly merits a full hearing from all parties.
In July, the Supreme Court found in McGirt v. Oklahoma that the Muscogee (Creek) Nation was never disestablished. Since then, state courts have said the same is true for the Cherokee, Choctaw and Seminole reservations.
The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals is weighing whether to uphold these rulings and establish a standard for handling cases — totaling in the hundreds — affected by McGirt.
Just last week, a judge in McClain County said a death row inmate was wrongly tried in state court because the crime occurred on the Chickasaw Nation's reservation and the victims were tribal members. It is one of many appeals by state inmates who argue they should have been tried in federal court.
Now, Hunter is asking Oklahoma's congressional delegation to propose legislation that would allow the Five Tribes, if they wish, to enter agreements giving state and federal prosecutors concurrent jurisdiction in major crimes on reservation lands. Since McGirt, the FBI and federal prosecutors, instead of local police and state prosecutors, are handling new criminal cases within the Creek reservation.
Hunter said the Creek land, which includes much of Tulsa, is unlike any Native American reservation in the country, given its land size and demographics — roughly 90% of those who live in the historical Creek lands are non-Indian, he said. That presents potential headaches legally, and those could grow if reservations are re-established for the other members of the Five Tribes.
“What we've tried to do is come up with a proposal that will give tribes the authority, subject to their decision, to work with the state … to share jurisdiction over crime,” he said. “The civil stuff, there are issues that have to be addressed. But the most immediate concern I have … is ensuring that we're providing the most optimal, the most hands-on effort to protect the public that we possibly can.”
It may be a tough sell with some tribes. Citing sovereignty concerns, a coalition of national Indian organizations wrote last week to Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Tulsa, warning against Congress trying to move quickly on “destructive legislation” that would try to clarify the state's criminal and civil jurisdiction.
However, Hunter said his effort potentially “increases their ability to exercise their sovereignty.”
The attorney general said his office respects the sovereignty recognized in the McGirt case, but it also wants to “be practical about 113 years of working with the tribes to protect not only tribal members but non-Indians in Oklahoma. I think those 113 years stand for something.”
The ripples from McGirt are enormous and ongoing. Hunter believes his plan provides a reasonable way to deal with an important one of those — prosecuting crimes. We wish him well.