## Facts

- The Hannahville Indian Community was an Indian reservation in Menominee County, Michigan, occupied by the Wisconsin Potowatomies of the Hannahville Indian Community (the tribe).
- Leroy Wandahsega was a member of the tribe. He and his wife, Faye Wandahsega, had three minor children—Leroy, Veronica, and Tyrone—who were also members of the tribal community.
- The family lived on the Hannahville reservation for a short time. Faye later separated from Leroy and took the children off the reservation.
- After leaving the reservation, Faye and the children stayed temporarily with Faye’s mother, then with a friend, and later in a rented trailer in Menominee County.
- On November 22, 1971, Faye left the children with family while she and her mother attended an appointment related to Faye’s possible move to Milwaukee.
- When Faye and her mother returned to Faye’s trailer, Leroy arrived and fatally shot Faye and her mother, and then killed himself.
- A juvenile officer from the Menominee County Department of Social Services filed a petition in the Menominee County Probate Court alleging that the children were dependent and without a legal custodian, and requested that the probate court take temporary custody.
- Over the following months, the probate court entered orders making the children temporary wards of the court, placing them in care, later making them permanent wards of the court, and ultimately making them available for adoption.
- The tribe sued Bernard Houston, Director of the Michigan Department of Social Services, in the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan, seeking custody of the children and a declaration that the tribe—rather than the state—had the right to decide the children’s custody, care, and control.
- The tribe contended that the state probate court lacked jurisdiction under federal law; Houston responded that tribal authority did not extend beyond reservation boundaries and that, because the children were outside the reservation, the state court could proceed.

## Issues

1. Whether the federal district court had jurisdiction to hear the tribe’s suit challenging the state’s custody and adoption proceedings involving tribal-member children.
2. Whether federal law and tribal sovereignty gave the Hannahville Indian Community exclusive authority over custody decisions for member children who were living off the reservation when the state proceedings began.
3. Whether the Michigan probate court’s wardship and adoption-related orders were invalid because the state lacked authority to exercise custody jurisdiction over these children.

## Decision

- The court concluded it could hear the dispute between the tribe and the state official because the case required deciding the allocation of authority under federal law.
- On the merits, the court rejected the tribe’s claim that it had exclusive custody jurisdiction in these circumstances.
- The court upheld Michigan’s authority, acting through the probate court, to exercise dependency/wardship jurisdiction over the children who were living off the reservation at the time of the events and the initiation of state proceedings.
- The court denied the tribe’s requested relief, leaving the state court’s custody and adoption-related orders in effect.

## Legal Principles

- A tribe may bring a federal action against a state official when the controversy turns on tribal rights and state authority under federal Indian law.
- Tribal sovereignty is recognized, but it operates within limits set by Congress; courts look to federal statutes and binding federal law to decide whether state authority is displaced.
- Territorial location and domicile matter: tribal authority over domestic-relations matters is strongest within reservation lands, while states generally retain child-protection authority over persons located within the state outside the reservation unless federal law provides otherwise.
- In the pre-ICWA legal setting, absent a federal statute or treaty allocating exclusive custody authority to the tribe for off-reservation children, state courts could apply their dependency and adoption statutes to tribal-member children living off-reservation.

## Conclusion

Wisconsin Potowatomies of the Hannahville Indian Community v. Houston held that, although the federal court could adjudicate the tribe’s federal-law challenge, federal law did not give the tribe exclusive custody authority over member children who were living off the reservation when the state case began, and Michigan’s probate court could continue its wardship and adoption-related proceedings.


Wisconsin Potowatomies of the Hannahville Indian Community v. Houston, 393 F. Supp. 719 (1973)