Gros Ventre Tribe v. United States

Appellants Gros Ventre Tribe, Assini-boine Tribe, and the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council (collectively “the Tribes”) appeal the district court’s order granting summary judgment for the United States. The Tribes filed suit in the District of Montana against the United States, its Bureau of Land Management (“BLM”), the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the Indian Health Service (collectively “the government”), alleging that the government had violated specific and general trust obligations to protect tribal trust resources (primarily water rights) by authorizing and planning to expand two cyanide heap-leach gold mines located upriver from the Tribes’ reservation. We affirm.

The Tribes urge a theory of liability conflating general trust law principles with an attack on agency inaction under the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”). See 5 U.S.C. § 706 (1). But none of the treaties cited by the Tribes impose a specific duty on the United States to regulate third parties or non-tribal resources for the benefit of the Tribes. Because the government’s general trust obligations must be analyzed within the confines of generally applicable statutes and regulations, we reject the…