Clinton-era opinion at center of Pueblo claim

FROM THE ARCHIVE

Facebook Twitter Email
THURSDAY, APRIL 25, 2002

A former Clinton administration official came under fire on Wednesday for an 11th-hour legal opinion that favored a New Mexico tribe's controversial land claim.

On his last day in office, then-Department of Interior Solicitor John D. Leshy wrote an opinion concluding Sandia Pueblo was wrongly deprived of 10,000 acres of land. The January 19, 2001, document lent weight to the tribe's long-running claim to the west face of the Sandia Mountains.

But an historian originally hired by the government to fight the claim accused Leshy of stretching the facts. Stanley Hordes, a private consultant and University of New Mexico professor, said Leshy "misconstrued" and "misrepresented" his research, which he claimed was objective and non-adversarial.

"The Interior opinion made significant errors regarding issues of historical interpretation and historical fact," he told two Congressional panels yesterday.

Representatives of landowners and a local county involved in the dispute also criticized the opinion, which former Secretary Bruce Babbitt signed off on. Anita Miller of the Sandia Mountain Coalition, a group of local homeowners, and Tim Cummins, a Bernalillo County commissioner, asked the lawmakers to invalidate Leshy's work.

Testifying before a joint hearing of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee and the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Leshy defended the opinion. Since a federal judge vacated a Reagan administration opinion regarding the Pueblo's boundaries, he said he needed to act.

"I would have been irresponsible to leave office without following the court's directive," he said of the last-minute decision, adding he believed it would stand up to additional judicial scrutiny.

With a bill to settle the land claim under consideration, the document is gaining in significance. Unless Congress acts by November of this year, the opinion calls on the department to correct the tribe's reservation to include the 10,000 acres.

Sandia Pueblo Gov. Stuwart Paisano said his tribe would seek to have the opinion enforced if the bill fails. "To our people, no issue is more important that Sandia Mountains," he told the committees.

Bill G. Myers, the current Solicitor, didn't express a concrete view. "I suspect I will have a third opinion," if asked to revisit the issue, he suggested.

But like all others at the hearing, he said the Bush administration favors a settlement. "Right now the plan is to see what Congress does," he added.

Timeline of Recent Events:
1983 - Pueblo asks Reagan administration to resurvey boundary to include 10,000 acres on west face of Sandia Mountains.
1988 - Then-Solicitor Ralph W. Tarr issues opinion denying tribe's claim.
1994 - Pueblo asks Clinton administration to withdraw Tarr opinion. Tribe files suit after Solicitor John D. Leshy declines.
1998 - U.S. District Judge Harold Greene vacates one part of Tarr opinion regarding Pueblo boundary.
1999 - While Greene's decision is on appeal, parties come to a settlement but landowners and Bernalillo County withdraw.
November 2000 - Federal appeals court dismisses appeal, directs Interior to reconsider Tarr opinion.
Deceember 2000 - Leshy issues opinion on Tarr.
January 2001 - Leshy issues opinion on Pueblo boundary.
June 2001 - Incoming Solicitor Bill G. Myers says he doesn't have "agenda" on predecessor's actions.
March 2002 - Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) introduces land claim settlement.

Related Documents:
Written Witness Testimony (4/24)

Get the Bill:
A bill to establish the T'uf Shur Bien Preservation Trust Area within the Cibola National Forest in the State of New Mexico to resolve a land claim involving the Sandia Mountain Wilderness, and for other purposes (S.2018)

Related Solicitor Opinons:
Tarr Opinion (December 9, 1988) | Tarr Opinion Reconsidered (December 5, 2000) | Eastern Boundary of Sandia Pueblo (January 19, 2001)

Related Decisions:
Sandia v. Babbitt (December 1996) | Sandia v. Babbitt (July 1998) | Pueblo of Sandia v. Babbitt (November 2000)

Relevant Links:
Sandia Pueblo - http://www.sandiapueblo.nsn.us