United States v. Joseph’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

42 federal appellate · 17 district · 19 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 106 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““We find that it is wholly different from that of the Indian tribes to whom the act of Congress applies. The United States have not recognized in these latter any- other than a passing title, with right of use, until by treaty or otherwise that right is extinguished. And the ultimate title has been always held to he in the United States, with no right in the Indians to transfer it, or even their possession, without consent of the government. It is this fixed Claim of dominion which lies at the foundation of the act forbidding the white man to make a settlement on the lands occupied by an Indian tribe. The Pueblo Indians, on the contrary, hold their lands by a right superior to that of the United States. Their title dates back to grants made by the government of Spain before the Mexican Revolution — a title which was fully recognized by the Mexican government, and protected by it in the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, by which this country and the allegiance of its inhabitants were transferred to the United States. With the purpose of carrying into effect this provision of that treaty, Congress directed the Surveyor General of New Mexico to make inquiry into all grants of the Spanish and Mexican governments, and to report to that body on their validity. Such reports were made from time to time, one of which included, and recoin-; mended for confirmation, this claim of ‘the pueblo of Taos, in the county of Taos’ — not the Pueblo Indians of Taos, but the pueblo of Taos; and by an a”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. United States v. Sandoval · Territory of New Mexico v. Persons, Real Estate Land & Property

2. “'For centuries . . . the pueblo Indians have lived in villages, in fixed communities, each having its own municipal or local government. . . . [T]hey are a peaceable, industrious, intelligent, honest, and virtuous people. They are Indians only in feature, complexion, and a few of their habits; in all other respects superior to all but a few of the civilized Indian tribes of the country, and the equal of the most civilized thereof. . . .' ". . . When it became necessary to extend the laws regulating intercourse with the Indians over our new acquisitions from Mexico, there was ample room for the exercise of those laws among the nomadic Apaches, Comanches, Navajoes, and other tribes whose incapacity for self-government required both for themselves and for the citizens of the country this guardian care of the general government. "The pueblo Indians, if, indeed, they can be called Indians, had nothing in common with this class. The degree of civilization which they had attained centuries before, their willing submission to the laws of the Mexican government . . . and their absorption into the general mass of the population . . . all forbid the idea that they should be classed with the Indian tribes for whom the intercourse acts were made. . . .”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company v. Pueblo of Santa Ana · Joint Tribal Council of the Passamaquoddy Tribe v. Morton

3. “regulating trade and intercourse with the Indian.tribes,”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. United States v. Candelaria · Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company v. Pueblo of Santa Ana