Alabama-Coushatta Join Supreme Court Case that Could Legalize Tribal Gaming in Texas
The Alabama-Coushatta Tribe of Lone-Star State has united a US Supreme Court case which could legitimise tribal gaming in the Lone Star State.
The tribe has filed an amicus legal brief inwards the case, brought by the El Paso-based Ysleta del Sur Pueblo Tribe (Tigua). America’s highest homage testament see historical dominion tribunal rulings that hold scuttled the II tribes’ ambitions to coordinate gaming on their monarch lands inward Texas.
These include a 1994 ruling that the tell has long cited when forcing their modest electronic bingo operation to close.
“The Supreme Court’s determination to hear this typesetter's case has given us desire that the state’s travail to place our employees come out of act testament finally end,” Nita Battise, Chairperson of the Alabama-Coushatta Tribe of Texas’ Tribal Council, told local ABC affiliate KLTV.
This slip is vitally important to our Tribe. Hundreds of jobs are at stake, as well as our long-term future and sustainability as a Tribe,” Battise added.
The tribe’s Naskila Gaming Hall, 100 miles north-east of Houston, is the second-largest employer in surrounding James K. Polk County, directly and indirectly, responsible for 700 jobs.
The state’s efforts to closed the facility downwards get consistently place these jobs at risk, Battise said.
Barred from Gaming
Both the Alabama-Coushatta and the Tigua were federally recognised by the Texas Restoration Act, 1986 (TRA). This restored their sovereign lands, but it came at a price. The move contained a clause barring the tribes from organizing gaming on those lands.
Just 2 years later, US Congress passed the Native American Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA), which enshrined the rights of federally recognized tribes to bid Class II gaming, such as bingo, on crowned head land.
That was provided this typewrite of gaming was legal elsewhere inwards the surrounding state, which is the pillow slip inwards Texas.
The II tribes debate they were coerced into signing TRA because they believed it was their one jibe at restoring their sovereignty.
Meanwhile, the Kickapoo tribe was recognised ii years earlier, in 1985, by a law that did non include a non-gaming clause. It has offered electronic bingo legally under IGRA for 20 years at its Lucky Eagle Casino, closely to the Mexican border.
The tribes believe IGRA should supersede the TRA. The 1994 territory courtroom determination disagreed and has been used to stymie the tribes’ ambitions ever since.
Tide Turning
But the surge appears to follow turning. It’s crystalise the Biden judicature sides with the tribes, although thither is no insure the judiciary will travel along suit.
In August, Acting US Solicitor General Brian John Fletcher wrote to the Supreme Court, asking it to read upwards the case.
He called the 1994 ruling “an error” that had “impaired the uniformity of a federal regulatory scheme, [and] has unambiguously disadvantaged II American Indian tribes.”
A positive degree conclusion for the tribes could get an wallop inward other states where tribes were recognised past legislation that contained non-gaming clauses, viz. Massachusetts, Maine, and Rhode Island.