The Cayuga Nation is suing New York State for what it claims is the “Thruway’s incursion through the Northeast section of the Nation’s 64,000-acre reservation.”
The suit, filed in Federal District Court, seeks to compel the State to obtain federal approval of the Thruway right-of-way, pay the Nation compensation, and turn over to the Nation the proceeds of tolls collected for use of the Thruway through the Reservation.
Clint Halftown, the Nation’s Federal Representative and member of the Nation’s Council, said: “The Nation, by bringing this matter to Court, seeks to extract the just compensation the Nation and its citizens are owed for the State’s unlawful incursions.” He went on to explain, “The Nation’s Reservation was set aside by the Treaty of Canandaigua, and the Thruway’s intrusion of the Reservation violates the Federal Right-of-Way Act. The Nation will pursue this litigation to compel the State to comply with Federal law by providing just compensation for the unlawful intrusion.”
In a news release from Cayuga Nation, it claims the “State’s continued operation of the Thruway through the Nation’s Reservation without a valid right-of-way approved by federal officials violates the Nation’s sovereign right to its Reservation, as established by the Treaty of Canandaigua in 1794. The Treaty recognized that the 64,015 acres reserved to the Cayuga Nation were for the Nation’s ‘free use and enjoyment thereof."”
To this day, Congress has never disestablished the Nation’s Reservation, nor authorized the sale of the Nation’s reservation lands, which principle has been upheld by the various state and federal courts to examine the issue.
In recognition of the need to protect Indian lands, such as the Cayuga Nation Reservation, from unlawful incursions, Congress enacted the Right-of-Way Act in 1948, which provides that “[n]o grant of a right-of-way shall be made [through Indian reservations] without the payment of such compensation as the Secretary of the Interior shall determine to be just.” The Nation claims the State, in constructing the Thruway in the 1950s, failed to obtain the approval of the Secretary of the Interior to place the Thruway across the Nation’s Reservation.
The Cayuga Nation’s suit is similar to one filed by the Seneca Nation regarding the Thruway’s incursion across the Seneca Reservation in western New York. The Judge in that case denied the State’s motion to dismiss earlier this year.
