Barbara Boxer: “I am delighted that a compromise was reached yesterday on Sections 118 and 120 to the Interior Appropriations bill. As a…”

“I am delighted that a compromise was reached yesterday on Sections 118 and 120 to the Interior Appropriations bill. As a Senator for California and as a citizen, I am greatly relieved that these two provisions will no longer endanger the rights of our Nation's Indian tribes. Sections 118 and 120 would have directly violated the bargain struck between the United States and Indian tribes over a century ago. In hundreds of treaties, the United States agreed to make payments to Indian tribes in exchange for nearly 100 million acres of tribal lands. Section 118, which would have imposed a means test on these payments, violates both the letter and the spirit of these contracts. The result would have been to impose a penalty against tribal governments for improving services for their citizens and trying to achieve self-sufficiency. Section 120 would have gone even further in violating the promises the United States made to the tribes. It would have required tribes to choose between the payments promised to them and their inherent right to sovereign immunity, a right acknowledged in the United States Constitution.”