Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. 515, was a case in which the United States Supreme
Court vacated the conviction of Samuel Worcester and held that the Georgia
criminal statute that prohibited non-Native Americans from being present
on Native American lands without a license from the state was
unconstitutional. The opinion is most famous for its
dicta, which laid out the relationship between tribes and the state and federal
governments, stating that the federal government was the sole authority to
deal with Indian nations. It is considered to have built the foundations
of the doctrine of tribal sovereignty in the United States.
Facts Chief Justice John Marshall laid out in
this opinion that the relationship between the Indian Nations and the
United States is that of nations. He argued that the United States, in the
character of the federal government, inherited the rights of Great Britain as
they were held by that nation. Those rights, he stated, include the sole
right to deal with the Indian nations in North America, to the exclusion of any
other European power. This did not include the rights of possession to
their land or political dominion over their laws. He acknowledged that the
exercise of conquest and purchase can give political dominion, but those are
in the hands of the federal government and not in the hands of the individual
states. The court ruled that the individual
states had no authority in American Indian affairs.
= Jackson's response = In a popular quotation that is believed
to be apocryphal, President Andrew Jackson reportedly responded: "John
Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!" This derives from
Jackson's comments on the case in a letter to John Coffee, "...the decision
of the Supreme Court has fell still born, and they find that they cannot
coerce Georgia to yield to its mandate,".
The ruling in Worcester ordered that Worcester be freed, and Georgia complied
after several months. In 1833, the newly elected governor, Wilson Lumpkin,
offered to pardon Worcester and Butler if they ceased their activities among
the Cherokee. The two complied and were freed. They never returned to Cherokee
land. The federal government and the Cherokee
were not party to the suit. Worcester imposed no obligations on Jackson; there
was nothing for him to enforce. The Court did not ask federal marshals to
carry out the decision, as had become standard. Worcester may be seen as a
prudential decision, for avoiding the possibility of political conflict
between the Court and the Executive, while still delivering what appeared to
be a pro-Indian decision. = As a tribal sovereignty precedent =
Marshall's language in Worcester may have been motivated by his regret that
his earlier opinions in Fletcher and Johnson had been used as a justification
for Georgia's actions. Justice Story considered it similarly, writing in a
letter to his wife dated March 4, 1832: "Thanks be to God, the Court can wash
their hands clean of the iniquity of oppressing the Indians and disregarding
their rights." Because Jackson proceeded with Cherokee removal, Worcester did not
aid indigenous rights at the time. Worcester has been cited in several
later opinions on the subject of tribal sovereignty in the United States.
Notes References
Stuart Banner, How the Indians Lost Their Land: Law and Power on the
Frontier, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005.
Berutti, Ronald A.. "The Cherokee Cases: The Fight to Save the Supreme Court and
the Cherokee Indians". American Indian Law Review 17: 291–308.
doi:10.2307/20068726. Burke, Joseph C.. "The Cherokee Cases: A
Study in Law, Politics, and Morality". Stanford Law Review 21: 500–531.
doi:10.2307/1227621. JSTOR 1227621. Chused, Richard. Cases, Materials, and
Problems in Property. New York: M. Bender. ISBN 0-8205-4135-4.
Lytle, Cliford M.. "The Supreme Court, Tribal Sovereignty, and Continuing
Problems of State Encroachment into Indian Country". American Indian Law
Review 8: 65–77. doi:10.2307/20068139. Jill Norgren, The Cherokee Cases: Two
Landmark Federal Decisions in the Fight for Sovereignty.
Prucha, Francis Paul. The Great Father: The United States Government and the
American Indians I. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-3668-9.
Lindsay G. Robertson, Conquest by Law: How the Discovery of America
Dispossessed Indigenous Peoples of Their Lands.
Smith, Jean Edward. John Marshall: Definer Of A Nation. New York: Henry
Holt & Company. ISBN 0-8050-1389-X. Charles Warren. The Supreme Court in
United States History,. 2 vols. External links
Text of Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. 515 is available from: Findlaw Justia
Worcester v. Georgia in the New Georgia Encyclopedia