Daniel Inouye: “with the greatest respect for my friend from Florida, I rise in opposition to the amendments he proposes to the Interior…”

“with the greatest respect for my friend from Florida, I rise in opposition to the amendments he proposes to the Interior appropriations bill. As similar amendments have done in prior years, this amendment seeks to prevent Indian tribal governments from engaging in activities that have been authorized by the U.S. Congress and sanctioned by the Supreme Court of the United States. My colleagues know well that there has been a serious impasse in the operation of federal law, the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act--IGRA--since 1996. In that year, the Supreme Court concluded that the means by which tribal governments could have recourse to the Federal courts if a State refused to negotiate for a tribal-State compact violated the states' eleventh amendment immunity to suit. Thus, while there are presently over 128 tribal-State compacts as many as 24 States, in those States where tribal-State compact negotiations had not been brought to fruition by 1996, the Court's ruling gave those States a trump card in the negotiations. Those States--and there are only a few--now had a means of avoiding compliance with the Federal law altogether. They could refuse to negotiate any further, or refuse to negotiate at all, with the knowledge that tribal governments had no remedy at law and no recourse to the Federal courts.”