Oklahoma Tax Commission v. Chickasaw Nation (515 U.S. 450)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 14, 1995 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 515 U.S. 450 · 115 S. Ct. 2214
- Decided
- June 14, 1995
- Term
- October Term 1994
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice Ginsburg
- Issue area
- Civil Rights
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court. This case concerns the taxing authority of the State of Oklahoma over the Chickasaw Nation (Tribe) and its members. We take up two questions: (1) May Oklahoma impose its motor fuels excise tax upon fuel sold by Chickasaw Nation retail stores on tribal trust land; (2) May Oklahoma impose its income tax upon members of the Chickasaw Nation who are employed by the Tribe but who reside in the State outside Indian country. We hold that Oklahoma may not apply its motor fuels tax, as currently designed, to fuel sold by the Tribe in Indian country. In so holding, we adhere to settled law: when Congress does not instruct otherwise, a State’s excise tax is unenforceable if its legal incidence falls on a Tribe or its members for sales made within Indian country. We further hold, however, that Oklahoma may tax the income (including wages from tribal employment) of all persons, Indian and non-Indian alike, residing in the State outside Indian country. The Treaty between the United States and the Tribe, which guarantees the Tribe and its members that “no Territory or State shall ever have a right to pass laws for the government of” the Chickasaw Nation, does not displace the rule, accepted interstate and internationally, that a sovereign may tax the entire income of its residents. I The Chickasaw Nation, a federally recognized Indian…
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