Background
The Presentment Clause of Article I of the US Constitution states that a bill that the President has not signed and not vetoed becomes law ten days (not including Sundays) after being sent to the President "unless the Congress by their Adjournment prevent its Return, in which Case it shall not be a Law."
The action of the President allowing a bill to expire without signing it after the adjournment of Congress is known as a pocket veto, which had been used by Presidents since James Madison.
In 1926, the US Congress passed Senate Bill 3185, allowing American Indians in Washington State to sue for damages from the loss of their tribal lands. On June 24, 1926, the bill was sent to President Calvin Coolidge for him to sign or veto. Congress adjourned for the summer on July 3. After July 6, the tenth day after the bill's passage, it had received neither a presidential signature nor a veto.
Several Indian tribes (the Okanogan, Methow, Sanpoil, Nespelem, Colville, and the Lake Indian Tribes) filed suit in the United States Court of Claims, which ruled that their case had no legal merit. The Indian tribes appealed to the Supreme Court, which agreed to hear the case. Arguing on behalf of the United States, US Attorney General William D. Mitchell argued that the pocket veto was a long-established practice that had been used to decide many important cases. The case was argued on March 11, 1929 and was decided on May 27.
The case hinged on the definition of "adjournment" in Article I.
Article One of the United States Constitution establishes the legislative branch of the federal government, the United States Congress. Under Article One, Congress is a bicameral legislature consisting of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Article One grants Congress various enumerated powers and the ability to pass laws "necessary and proper" to carry out those powers. Article One also establishes the procedures for passing a bill and places various limits on the powers of Congress and the states from abusing their powers.
The federal government of the United States is the national government of the United States, a federal republic in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a federal district, five major self-governing territories and several island possessions. The federal government, sometimes simply referred to as Washington, is composed of three distinct branches: legislative, executive, and judicial, whose powers are vested by the U.S. Constitution in the Congress, the president and the federal courts, respectively. The powers and duties of these branches are further defined by acts of Congress, including the creation of executive departments and courts inferior to the Supreme Court.
A pocket veto is a legislative maneuver that allows a president or other official with veto power to exercise that power over a bill by taking no action, thus effectively killing the bill without affirmatively vetoing it. This depends on the laws of each country; the common alternative is that if the president takes no action a bill automatically becomes law.
Separation of powers is a political doctrine originating in the writings of Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu in The Spirit of the Laws, in which he argued for a constitutional government with three separate branches, each of which would have defined abilities to check the powers of the others. This philosophy heavily influenced the writing of the United States Constitution, according to which the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial branches of the United States government are kept distinct in order to prevent abuse of power. This United States form of separation of powers is associated with a system of checks and balances.
The Colville Indian Reservation is an Indian reservation in the northwest United States, in north central Washington, inhabited and managed by the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, which is federally recognized.
The Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation is the federally recognized tribe that controls the Colville Indian Reservation, which is located in northeastern Washington, United States. It is the government for its people.
A concurrent resolution is a resolution adopted by both houses of a bicameral legislature that lacks the force of law and does not require the approval of the chief executive (president). Concurrent resolutions are typically adopted to regulate the internal affairs of the legislature that adopted them, or for other purposes, if authority of law is not necessary.
The Presentment Clause of the United States Constitution outlines federal legislative procedure by which bills originating in Congress become federal law in the United States.
The Methow River is a tributary of the Columbia River in northern Washington in the United States. The river's 1,890-square-mile (4,900 km2) watershed drains the eastern North Cascades, with a population of about 5,000 people. The Methow's watershed is characterized by relatively pristine habitats, as much of the river basin is located in national forests and wildernesses. Many tributaries drain the large Pasayten Wilderness. An earlier economy based on agriculture is giving way to one based on recreation and tourism.
The Sanpoil are a Native American people of the U.S. state of Washington. They are one of the Salish peoples and are one of the twelve members of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation.
The Nespelem people belong to one of twelve aboriginal Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation in eastern Washington. They lived primarily near the banks of the Nespelem River, an Upper Columbia River tributary, in an area now known as Nespelem, Washington, located on the Colville Indian Reservation. Alternate spellings include Nespelim or Nespilim.
The Colville people, are a Native American people of the Pacific Northwest. The name Colville comes from association with Fort Colville, named after Andrew Colvile of the Hudson's Bay Company. Okanagan: sx̌ʷyʔiɬpx) Earlier, outsiders often called them Scheulpi, Chualpay, or Swhy-ayl-puh; the French traders called them Les Chaudières in reference to Kettle Falls. The neighboring Coeur d'Alene called them Sqhwiyi̱'ɫpmsh and the Spokane knew them as Sxʷyelpetkʷ.
Merrion v. Jicarilla Apache Tribe, 455 U.S. 130 (1982), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States holding that an Indian tribe has the authority to impose taxes on non-Indians that are conducting business on the reservation as an inherent power under their tribal sovereignty.
Oklahoma Tax Commission v. Sac & Fox Nation, 508 U.S. 114 (1993), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that absent explicit congressional direction to the contrary, it must be presumed that a State does not have jurisdiction to tax tribal members who live and work in Indian country, whether the particular territory consists of a formal or informal reservation, allotted lands, or dependent Indian communities.
Seymour v. Superintendent of Wash. State Penitentiary, 368 U.S. 351 (1962), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States that the state of Washington did not have jurisdiction to try an Indian for a crime committed within the boundaries of the Colville Indian Reservation, even if the crime was committed on land now owned by a non-Indian.
Williams v. Lee, 358 U.S. 217 (1959), was a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the State of Arizona does not have jurisdiction to try a civil case between a non-Indian doing business on a reservation with tribal members who reside on the reservation, the proper forum for such cases being the tribal court.
Antoine v. Washington, 420 U.S. 194 (1975), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that treaties and laws must be construed in favor of Native Americans (Indians); that the Supremacy Clause precludes the application of state game laws to the tribe; that Congress showed no intent to subject the tribe to state jurisdiction for hunting; and while the state can regulate non-Indians in the ceded area, Indians must be exempted from such regulations.
The following events occurred in May 1929:
In the United States, the president can use the veto power to prevent a bill passed by the Congress from becoming law. Congress can override the veto by a two-thirds vote of both chambers.
