Bryan v. Itasca County

Bryan v. Itasca County
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued April 20, 1976 Decided June 14, 1976
Full case name	Russell Bryan v. Itasca County, Minnesota
Citations	426 U.S. 373 (more) 96 S. Ct. 2102; 48 L. Ed. 2d 710; 1976 U.S. LEXIS 61
Case history
Prior	Bryan v. Itasca County, 228 N.W.2d 249 (Minn. 1975).
Holding
Minnesota did not have the right to assess a tax on the property of an Indian living on tribal land absent a specific Congressional grant of authority to do so
Court membership
Chief Justice Warren E. Burger Associate Justices William J. Brennan Jr. · Potter Stewart Byron White · Thurgood Marshall Harry Blackmun · Lewis F. Powell Jr. William Rehnquist · John P. Stevens
Case opinion
Majority	Brennan, joined by unanimous
Laws applied
28 U.S.C. § 1360

Bryan v. Itasca County, 426 U.S. 373 (1976), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that a state did not have the right to assess a tax on the property of a Native American (Indian) living on tribal land absent a specific Congressional grant of authority to do so.

The case arose when a Minnesota county taxed an Indian's mobile home located on the reservation. The Court ruled that the state did not have the authority to impose such a tax or, more generally, to regulate behavior on the reservation. Bryan has become a landmark case that has led to Indian gaming on reservations and altered the economic status of almost every Indian tribe. Later decisions, citing Bryan, ruled that Public Law 280 allows states to enact prohibitions, or crimes, that would apply on reservations, but could not impose regulations on conduct that was otherwise allowed. The case has also called into question the ability of the states to impose any sort of regulations on tribal reservations, such as labor standards and certain traffic regulations.^[1]