2026 Summer Indian Law Courses
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Instructor: Professor Deb Dumontier, 猎奇重口 Alexander Blewett III School of Law
This course looks at fundamental aspects of American Indian law and provides a basic understanding of core Indian law principles, both on the federal and tribal level. The course familiarizes participants with the development of foundational concepts in the area of Indian law and addresses the continuing impact of federal legislation and court actions on tribal governance structures and principles of sovereignty. In addition to providing substantive information on legal principles associated with American Indian law, participants will engage in practical skill-building exercises that build upon the substantive materials being covered.
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Instructor: Maranda Compton, Lepwe
Who decides what happens to land, water, air, and sacred places in Indian Country? What is preserved? And when does development take priority? Far from being a subset of federal regulation, environmental law in Indian country is a jurisdictional patchwork, shaped by inherent Tribal sovereignty, federal trust responsibilities, state assertions of authority, and a history of disposition and disproportional impacts. This medley of concerns and oversight plays out in all types of project development, from mining to transmission lines, wind farms to data centers. This course will review the current frameworks for environmental regulation, governance, and environmental justice. We will address the various layers of environmental laws implicated by Tribal rights and resources and the roles played by Tribal Nations, federal agencies, states, and project proponents in development and regulation. Rather than approaching environmental law as purely procedural, this course interrogates who holds decision-making power and whose voices are centered—or marginalized—in permitting processes. Students will analyze how environmental review, Tribal consultation, and deregulation can either advance or undermine Tribal self-determination and either improve or delay project permitting. We will also review modern strategies for responsible project development, including Tribal Benefit Agreements and Tribal coordination. And we will analyze recent changes to environmental permitting and their relative impact on development and impact management.
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Instructor: Professor Jordan Gross, University of Idaho College of Law
This course examines the relationship between criminal justice policy and the wellbeing of Tribal communities in the United States. Specific topics we address include: (1) how wrongdoing in Indian Country is defined, investigated, prosecuted and punished, (2) the allocation of Tribal, State, and federal jurisdiction over wrongdoing in Indian Country, and (3) how federal Indian Country law and policy promote or undermine Tribal sovereignty, self-determination, and public safety interests. Upon completing this course, students will be able to identify and analyze the law, facts and circumstances relevant to determining which sovereign has jurisdiction to investigate, prosecute and punish wrongdoing in Indian Country, and to critically evaluate the quality and availability of criminal justice in Indian Country.
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Instructors: Professor Kathryn R.L. Rand, University of Nevada Las Vegas William S. Boyd School of Law; Professor Steven Andrew Light, University of Nevada Las Vegas William S. Boyd School of Law
This course covers statutes, regulations, and case law pertaining to Indian gaming issues, with particular focus on the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act. Participants will learn about Indian gaming's origins and policy goals, how tribal gaming is regulated, the tribal-state compacting process required for casino-style gaming, and contemporary issues that are shaping the future of Indian gaming.
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Instructors: Professor Michelle Bryan, 猎奇重口 Alexander Blewett III School of Law; Professor Monte Mills, University of Washington School of Law
This place-based learning experience focuses on the Elwha River and the Salish Sea encompassing the myriad natural resource, environmental, governmental, legal, policy, and practical issues embedded in this region. We approach these issues by immersing ourselves in the place and working to understand the ways in which law and policy interact with it. Aside from the course faculty, students will hear from tribal representatives, private conservationists, federal land managers, and other stakeholders involved in management of the Elwha River and the Salish Sea. Themes explored include the myth and reality of public lands; wildlife management across jurisdictions; water law; cooperative management; and the intersection of tribal rights, sovereignty, and interests with federal, state, and private interests—both historical and continuing.
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Instructors: Professor Monte Mills, Monte Mills, University of Washington School of Law; Brian Upton, Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes
Since time immemorial, Native Nations and their citizens have engaged in deep relations with the lands, waters, wildlife, and natural environment of what is now the United States. Over the last two centuries, various laws, policies, and practices imposed upon those Nations dispossessed them of many of those connections. Where they persisted, applicable laws and policies often ignored or marginalized such Indigenous interests in the ownership or management of what came to be known as natural resources. Consistent with the rise of Indigenous sovereignty over the last half-century, Native Nations are now actively reviving, reclaiming, and expanding their roles in the stewardship of lands, waters, wildlife, and ecosystems, both within and beyond their Reservation homelands. With a focus on federal public lands and resources, this course explores the history, context, and evolution of the current laws and policies relevant to that movement, including the legal and policy strategies of co-management, co-stewardship, and land back.
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Instructor: Professor Kekek Stark, 猎奇重口 Alexander Blewett III School of Law
Because tribes are sovereign governments, the field of Indian Law encompasses distinct legal issues and legal sources. Researching both federal Indian law (the law of the relationship between tribal governments and the U.S. government) and tribal law (the law of individual tribes) requires an additional set of tools and research skills to those students are introduced to in a basic legal research course. In this course, students will learn the skills and sources necessary to research general Indian law issues as well as the very specialized skills and sources used in researching the legal history of a tribe, including reserved treaty rights. The course will cover researching treaties, Indian land claims, statutory and case law, and tribal law. Students will actively participate in creating a tribal legal history throughout the course.
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Instructors: Wesley Furlong, Native American Rights Fund
This course covers the study of Alaska Native Law and Policy as a study “of the laws— and there are many— historically applied to Alaska Natives. Increasingly, it is the story of the Indigenous Peoples of Alaska remaking these laws into the tools of their own choosing, tools they are still fashioning. From the Iñupiaq of the North to the Athabascan and Yupiit of Alaska’s geographic center and western coast to the Alutiq of the North Pacific to the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian Indians of Southeast Alaska, Alaska Natives use skill and resolve to protect their patrimony, revive their rights to the subsistence way of life, assume control over their own health and social services, and successfully litigate their claims to sovereignty.”
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Instructor: Judge Anthony Johnson, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit; Meghanlata Gupta, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
This course will introduce participants to the distinctive constitutional issues arising from and affecting Indian country. The class will cover the legal history of federal Indian law, dating from pre-constitutional times to the modern era of federal Indian law beginning in 1959. In doing so, the course will examine the Indian canons of construction doctrine. The class will also address critical modern era cases and their impacts on contemporary tribal governance and Indian affairs.