United States v. Washington

In 1854 and 1855, Indian tribes in the Pacific Northwest entered into a series of treaties, now known as the “Stevens Treaties,” negotiated by Isaac I. Stevens, Superintendent of Indian Affairs and Governor of Washington Territory. Under the Stevens Treaties (“Treaties”) at issue in this case, the tribes relinquished large swaths of land west of the Cascade Mountains and north of the Columbia River drainage area, including the Puget Sound watershed, the watersheds of the Olympic Peninsula north of the Grays Harbor watershed, and the offshore waters adjacent to those areas (collectively, the “Case Area”), in what is now the State of Washington. In exchange for their land, the tribes were guaranteed a right to off-reservation fishing, in a clause that used essentially identical language in each treaty. The “fishing clause” guaranteed “the right of taking fish, at all usual and accustomed grounds and stations ... in common with all citizens of the Territory.”

In 2001, pursuant to an injunction previously entered in this long-running litigation, twenty-one Indian tribes (“Tribes”), joined by the United States, filed a “Request for Determination” — in effect, a complaint — in…