## Facts

- The Wind River Reservation is held by the United States in trust for the Northern Arapaho Tribe and the Eastern Shoshone Tribe as undivided joint beneficial owners (tenants in common).
- Each tribe maintains a separate constitution and business council for its internal governance.
- Because many property and governmental interests on the reservation are jointly held, a Joint Business Council composed of members of both tribes’ business councils met to decide matters implicating undivided property or shared sovereign rights.
- The Department of the Interior, through the Bureau of Indian Affairs, implemented regulations and administrative requirements that directed certain actions affecting joint property and shared interests to be taken through joint decisionmaking structures, including in connection with approvals under the Indian Reorganization Act.
- The Northern Arapaho Tribe challenged these federal requirements as exceeding Interior’s authority and as impairing the Tribe’s separate sovereignty by forcing joint governance with the Eastern Shoshone Tribe.

## Issues

1. Whether the Secretary of the Interior had statutory authority to require joint decisionmaking for matters involving undivided reservation property or shared sovereign interests on a jointly owned reservation.
2. Whether requiring action through a Joint Business Council unlawfully diminished the Northern Arapaho Tribe’s separate sovereignty or forced an improper consolidation of the tribes’ governments.
3. Whether Interior’s regulations and their application to the Wind River Reservation were arbitrary, capricious, or contrary to law.

## Decision

- The Tenth Circuit affirmed the judgment for the federal defendants and upheld Interior’s regulatory framework.
- The court held the Secretary acted within statutory authority in requiring joint decisionmaking on matters affecting undivided property and shared sovereign rights.
- The court rejected the claim that the joint-governance requirement unlawfully infringed tribal sovereignty, emphasizing that each tribe retained its separate internal government and that the joint body’s role was limited to genuinely shared matters.
- The court accepted Interior’s approach as a lawful means of administering trust property and protecting the interests of both beneficial owners.

## Legal Principles

- When two tribes hold reservation lands in undivided joint ownership and share related sovereign interests, federal officials may require a joint decisionmaking mechanism for actions affecting those undivided property interests or shared sovereign rights.
- A federally required joint decisionmaking arrangement does not, without more, violate tribal sovereignty where each tribe retains separate constitutions, officers, and authority over internal matters, and the joint body acts only on shared interests.
- The Secretary of the Interior has broad authority under federal Indian law, including the Indian Reorganization Act, to approve and regulate tribal constitutional and corporate actions and to structure administration of jointly held trust property in a manner rationally connected to protecting all beneficial owners.

## Conclusion

The Tenth Circuit upheld Interior’s use of a Joint Business Council framework for the Wind River Reservation, holding that joint decisionmaking for undivided property and shared sovereign matters was within the Secretary’s authority and did not merge or eliminate the tribes’ separate governments.


N. Arapaho Tribe v. Hodel, 808 F.2d 741 (10th Cir. 1987)