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1 1 (October 14, 2021)

handle is hein.crs/goveeqj0001 and id is 1 raw text is: C o g r s i o a R e e a c S e r v i c e October 14, 2021 Tribal Lands: An Overview Tribal lands can have a complicated and intermingled mix of land ownership and designation statuses. For instance, some federally recognized Indian tribes (hereinafter referred to as tribes) have reservations, whereas other tribes do not. Tribes may have land held in trust by the federal government or tribes may own restricted fee lands. Still other tribes may be landless. Because tribal lands may have different ownership statuses, tribes and tribal members may have different rights to manage and develop their lands and resources. Further, the federal government has varying levels of responsibility to tribes and their members depending on the types of land holdings. The following are common tribal land holdings: trust land, restricted fee land, and fee land. Other types of land designations, while not considered property holdings, can influence tribal land policy and may include trust, restricted fee, and fee lands within their scope. Such designations include allotted land, federal Indian reservations, and the term Indian Country (see A Note on Indian Country, below). The various types of tribal land holdings and land designations are summarized below and in Table 1. This In Focus also considers selected issues for Congress, including the fractionation of allotted lands and the land-into-trust process. For more information on tribal lands, see CRS Report R46647, Tribal Land and Ownership Statuses: Overview and Selected Issues for Congress, by Tana Fitzpatrick. Common Tribal Land Holdings Trust Lands Trust lands are lands owned by the federal government and held in trust for the benefit of the tribe communally or tribal members individually. The United States holds in trust approximately 55 million surface acres and 59 million acres of subsurface mineral estate for tribes and individual tribal members. Lands typically are brought into trust through the land-into-trust process. Under this process, land can be taken into trust through either mandatory acquisitions or discretionary acquisitions. Mandatory acquisitions occur when Congress directs the Secretary of the Interior (Secretary) to take land into trust on behalf of a tribe. The Secretary also may be mandated by court order to take land into trust. Discretionary trust acquisitions occur when the Secretary uses authority under the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA; 25 U.S.C. §§5101 et seq.) to approve bringing land into trust on behalf of a tribe. Restricted Fee Lands Restricted fee lands are owned by a tribe or tribal member but are subject to a restriction against alienation (i.e., sale or transfer) or encumbrance (i.e., liens, leases, rights-of-way, etc.) by operation of law. For some purposes, Congress has defined tribal lands to include trust and restricted fee lands, such as for leasing Indian agricultural lands (25 U.S.C. §3703) and rights-of-way (25 U.S.C. §323). Fee Lands In the context of tribal lands, fee lands are lands owned by a person who can freely alienate or encumber land without federal approval. The General Allotment Act, also known as the Dawes Act (Act of February 8, 1887, Ch. 119, 24 Stat. 388), authorized the conveyance of tribal and individual tribal member ownership of land to non-Indians. Many fee lands were created when land passed out of tribal or tribal member ownership under the General Allotment Act. Although the IRA explicitly ended the conveyance, or allotment, of tribal reservations in 1934, today trust or restricted fee lands can still be converted to fee lands. For example, individual tribal members can request that the Secretary remove the restriction against alienation on trust or restricted fee lands, making the parcel freely alienable. The federal government typically does not have a role in land management activities that include fee interests. Other Land Designations Allotted Lands Allotted lands are lands held in trust or restricted fee status by individual tribal members, sometimes referred to as allottees or landowners. Allotted lands do not include fee lands. Allotted lands stem from treaties and statutes, including the General Allotment Act, which divided land communally held by tribes and allotted parcels of it to individual tribal members. Allotment led to fractionation of the land, which occurred when the undivided interest from the original allottees was passed down to multiple heirs, increasing with each generation. Many landowners-at times hundreds-can be on one parcel of land. Further, when some allotments passed into fee, the result was a pattern of land ownership where fee parcels are interspersed with trust or restricted fee parcels-often referred to as checkerboarding. Checkerboarding and fractionation can contribute to jurisdictional and management challenges. Federal Indian Reservations Federal Indian reservations are areas reserved for a tribe, or multiple tribes, as permanent homelands through treaties, executive orders, acts of Congress, and administrative actions. Not all tribes have a reservation; however, tribes without a reservation could still have lands held in trust or restricted fee. Trust, restricted fee, and fee lands may exist within a tribe's reservation boundaries. Tribes also may have trust, restricted fee, or fee lands outside of reservation boundaries. ittps://Crsreports.congress.gt S

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