Williams v. Lee
| Williams v. Lee | |
|---|---|
| Argued November 20, 1958 Decided January 12, 1959 | |
| Full case name | Williams et ux. v. Lee, doing business as Ganado Trading Post |
| Citations | 358 U.S. 217 (more) 79 S. Ct. 269; 3 L. Ed. 2d 251; 1959 U.S. LEXIS 1656 |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Williams et ux. v. Lee, 319 P.2d 998 (Ariz. 1958). |
| Holding | |
| The state of Arizona does not have jurisdiction to try a civil case between a non-Indian doing business on a reservation with tribal members who reside on the reservation, the proper forum for such a case being the tribal court. | |
| Court membership | |
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| Case opinion | |
| Majority | Black, joined unanimously |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 3 | |
Williams v. Lee, 358 U.S. 217 (1959), was a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the State of Arizona does not have jurisdiction to try a civil case between a non-Indian doing business on a reservation with tribal members who reside on the reservation, the proper forum for such cases being the tribal court.
The Navajo tribe has lived in the southwestern United States and first came into contact with the United States government in 1846, signing a treaty with the government in 1849. In the early 1860s, the government removed the tribe from their traditional area to eastern New Mexico at the Bosque Redondo. In 1868, the United States and the tribe signed a new treaty to put it back on a reservation in their traditional lands, where the tribe focused on raising sheep and goats.