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In The Hoop
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2002

Welcome to In The Hoop, Indianz.Com's occasional column about assorted Indian issues.

Not Disbarred...Yet
The Supreme Court was packed on Monday for two hours of oral arguments for what will be the most anticipated Indian law decisions in years.

And in the audience was none other than Secretary of Interior Gale Norton herself. Her contemptuous behavior in the Indian trust fund lawsuit notwithstanding, she sat in the special section reserved for members of the Supreme Court Bar. As former attorney general for Colorado, she's argued cases before the justices, although not always successfully.

But that's not the good part. Just three seats away from Auntie Gale was none other than Dennis Gingold, lead attorney for the Cobell plaintiffs and the man responsible for her recent demise. Gingold has promised to have Norton's disbarred from the Colorado Bar and we hope this means she'll be forced to give up her seat at the Supreme Court to someone more worthy.

Don't count her minions among the good, though. For also in attendance at the hearing were Deputy Secretary Steve "I Knew Nothing About Indians, But Made Decisions About Them Anyway" Griles and Associate Deputy Secretary Jim "I Grew Up Poor, Now I Oversee Them" Cason. No word whether Ross "Montie Burns" Swimmer was lurking in the shadows, as he is wont to do.

Beating Up on Scalia
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia perturbed quite a few people with his insistence on relying on a hypothetical during the arguments. In case you weren't there, it went something like this: I give land to a city for a trust, the city does nothing with it, can the city citizens sue?

To Scalia, the answer was no. So, by extension, neither should Indians.

"If he were a student in my class and that was something he said on an exam, I'd give him an 'F,'" attorney Harry R. Sachse said yesterday at a panel discussion on the cases. "He's supposed to be really smart. That's a really dumb example."

"Sometimes his agenda interferes with his logic," said Charles A. Hobbs, another attorney who represents tribes.

Hodel's Folly
There weren't many kind words for former Secretary of Interior Donald P. Hodel either. He was never held in contempt for his actions on the Navajo Nation case but maybe he should have.

"He's not one of the people I admire in life," said Sachse.

In Your Hoop
Did you attend the oral arguments? What did you think? Email In the Hoop and let us know.