American Indian Law Restatement

The subject matter of this Restatement predates the birth of our nation. Some of the most important early decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, including ones authored by Chief Justice John Marshall, deal with the Law of American Indians. And tribes, along with the federal government and the states, are one of the three categories of sovereigns in the United States. (Excerpted from the Forward of Tentative Draft No. 1 by ALI Director Richard L. Revesz)

This field is so informed by history, probably more than any other in some ways. … Certainly in the field of Indian affairs, a lot of damage has been done in the past, and there are a lot of challenges for the future just to get things right from the perspective of those of us who believe that tribes should have a voice in this society, and that there are good rules to help bolster that voice. (Excerpted from an interview with Associate Reporter Kaighn Smith)

Project Reporters

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Reporter, American Indian Law Restatement

Matthew L.M. Fletcher is the Harry Burns Hutchins Collegiate Professor of Law at University of Michigan Law School. He teaches and writes in the areas of federal Indian law, American Indian tribal law, Anishinaabe legal and political philosophy, constitutional law, federal courts, and legal ethics. He is a member of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and sits as the Chief Justice of the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians and the Poarch Band of Creek Indians.

Wenona T. Singel

Associate Reporter, American Indian Law Restatement

Wenona T. Singel is the deputy legal counsel to the Office of the Governor for the State of Michigan. Ms. Singel is the first American Indian to hold this position in Michigan. Her position of deputy legal counsel includes serving as the advisor to the Governor on tribal affairs where she work to strengthen the government-to-government relationship between Michigan’s twelve federally-recognized tribes and the State of Michigan. Before her appointment, Ms. Singel was an associate professor at MSU College of Law and Associate Director of the Indigenous Law and Policy Center. She is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, and she received a J.D. from Harvard Law School.

Kaighn Smith, Jr.

Associate Reporter, American Indian Law Restatement

Kaighn Smith, Jr., leads Drummond Woodsum’s nationwide Indian Law Practice Group. He has represented Indian nations and their enterprises for more than 25 years in cases that focus on jurisdiction and sovereignty disputes, labor and employment relations, complex transactional disputes, environmental matters, and fishing and water rights.

A New Film Examines Sexual Violence as a Feature of the Bakken Oil Boom

Lauren Klosinski | July 5, 2018 | American Indian Law, Sexual Assault

From The Intercept: In the mid-2000s, the area surrounding the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota began to undergo a massive transformation after corporations figured out they could access vast wells of oil from the Bakken shale formation using fracking...

Predicting Supreme Court Behavior in Indian Law Cases

Grant Christensen | June 27, 2018 | American Indian Law

Since 1959 the Supreme Court has heard an average of 2.6 Indian law cases each term out of a recent average of approximately 80 cases. This paper attempts to identify which factors may be influencing the outcome of Indian law opinions by creating a new dataset of 156...

An Overview of Practicing American Indian Criminal Law in Federal, State, and Tribal Courts, and an Update About Recent Expansion of Criminal Jurisdiction Over Non-Indians

James Diamond | June 5, 2018 | American Indian Law

As a result of changes in federal law, criminal defendants or defense attorneys are now more likely to find themselves appearing in American Indian tribal courts. This article summarizes the very knotty jurisdictional maze that surrounds criminal law and American...

Tribal Powers over Nonmembers – Part 2

Jennifer Morinigo, Matthew L.M. Fletcher, Wenona T. Singel and Kaighn Smith, Jr. | April 30, 2018 | American Indian Law

This is the second post that presents the Sections from the 2018 American Indian Law Annual Meeting draft that deals with tribal powers over nonmembers. The previous post presented the Black Letter and Comments from § 34, Civil Regulatory and Adjudicatory Authority...

Tribal Powers over Nonmembers – Part 1

Matthew L.M. Fletcher, Wenona T. Singel, Kaighn Smith, Jr. and Jennifer Morinigo | April 17, 2018 | American Indian Law

In the American Indian Law project draft that will be presented at the 2018 Annual Meeting, two Sections deal with tribal powers over nonmembers – § 34, Civil Regulatory and Adjudicatory Authority over Nonmembers and § 35, Tribal-Court Exhaustion Rule. This is the...

Senate bills would expand tribal jurisdiction

Scott McKie | April 16, 2018 | American Indian Law

Language in a bill currently going through the Senate states, “Congress finds that American Indian children and Alaska Native children experience PTSD at a rate of 22 percent, which is the same rate at which Afghanistan and Iraq war veterans experience PTSD.” Several...

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