## Facts

- The Hopi Tribe is a federally recognized Indian tribe whose reservation in northeastern Arizona was established by an 1882 executive order withdrawing land from settlement and setting it apart for Hopi use and occupancy.
- Congress ratified the reservation arrangement in the Act of July 22, 1958, declaring the lands described in the 1882 executive order to be held by the United States in trust for the Hopi Indians (and any other Indians previously settled there).
- The Tribe alleged that public water systems serving five eastern communities on the reservation drew groundwater containing arsenic levels exceeding the federal maximum contaminant level set by regulation.
- The Tribe sought money damages from the United States to fund alternative safe drinking water sources and to repair or upgrade water systems.
- The Tribe asserted that the executive order, the 1958 Act, and various federal statutes and regulations created enforceable fiduciary duties requiring the United States to ensure safe and adequate drinking water on the reservation.

## Issues

1. Whether the Tribe identified a statute, regulation, treaty, or other source of law that imposed a specific fiduciary or substantive duty on the United States regarding provision of safe drinking water on the reservation.
2. Whether any identified source of law could fairly be interpreted as money-mandating so as to confer Tucker Act jurisdiction in the Court of Federal Claims.

## Decision

- The Federal Circuit affirmed the Court of Federal Claims’ dismissal for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction.
- The court held the Tribe failed to identify any money-mandating source of law imposing a specific obligation on the United States to provide adequate or safe drinking water on the reservation.
- The 1882 executive order and 1958 Act were construed as establishing a land trust and use-and-occupancy arrangement, not an affirmative, damages-enforceable duty to provide drinking water infrastructure.
- Federal drinking-water and environmental provisions cited by the Tribe were treated as regulatory standards that did not create a fiduciary obligation to the Tribe to build, fund, or upgrade reservation water systems, nor a damages remedy for noncompliance.
- Absent a money-mandating duty, the Court of Federal Claims lacked Tucker Act jurisdiction over the Tribe’s damages claim.

## Legal Principles

- Tucker Act jurisdiction for money damages requires identification of an independent substantive source of law that can fairly be interpreted as mandating compensation by the United States.
- A general trust relationship between the United States and an Indian tribe, without specific rights-creating or duty-imposing language, does not establish a money-mandating duty actionable for damages under the Tucker Act.
- Instruments creating or confirming a trust title to tribal lands do not, by themselves, impose specific affirmative obligations to provide governmental services or infrastructure.
- Regulatory environmental or drinking-water standards, without language assigning the United States a specific compensable duty to a tribe, do not convert alleged noncompliance into a Tucker Act damages claim.

## Conclusion

The Federal Circuit held that the Hopi Tribe’s allegations of unsafe drinking water could not proceed as a Tucker Act damages action because none of the cited executive, statutory, or regulatory authorities imposed a specific, money-mandating duty on the United States to provide or fund safe drinking water on the Hopi Reservation.


Hopi Tribe v. United States, 782 F.3d 662 (Fed. Cir. 2015)