United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit: Montana V. Gilham

1998 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 334-342

Our consideration of these questions of dominion and authority has its genesis in a personal tragedy. On January 14, 1986, Christine Gilham was fatally injured when the car in which she was a passenger struck a permanently anchored highway sign at the intersection of U.S. Highways 2 and 89 within the external boundaries of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, located in the State of Montana. Toni Gilham (“Gilham”), Christine's mother, brought an action against the driver of the car, who was intoxicated at the time of the accident, and the State of Montana (“Montana”) in the Blackfeet Tribal Court. She alleged that Montana was negligent in its design, construction, and maintenance of the intersection.

2020 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 180-182

On August 8, 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued an opinion in Bakalian v. Central Bank of Republic of Turkey, Case No. 13-55664. In this case, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's dismissal of plaintiffs’ claims seeking compensation from the Republic of Turkey and two Turkish national banks for lands that they claim were unlawfully confiscated from their ancestors during what the Court refers to as the Armenian Genocide of 1915–1923. In 2006, California adopted a statute extending the statute of limitations for claims arising out of the Armenian Genocide to December 31, 2016. Thus, the claims filed by the plaintiffs in 2010 were not time-barred under the statute; however, the panel found that since the Court had previously found the statute to be unconstitutional, no statute existed to extend the statute of limitations and therefore the claims were time-barred. The panel held that since the claims were plainly time-barred, the Court need not address legal questions posed regarding Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act jurisdiction.


2005 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Harding

On its surface, Bonnichsen v. United States is an administrative law case, reviewing a decision by the Secretary of the Interior regarding the appropriate reach of a specific set of legislative and regulatory rules. As such, Judge Gould, writing for a panel of the Ninth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals (Ninth Circuit) decided that the secretary's office had overstepped its bounds; in short, its interpretation of the rules in question was not reasonable. But underneath the legal categories, Bonnichsen is a much more complicated and politically charged case. It is about competing conceptions of history and spirituality. It is about sovereignty (although that word is not uttered once in the decision, aside from reciting a definition of Native Hawaiians) and the clash of cultures. It is less about the standards for decision making and more about who the appropriate decision makers are. It is a case about a man who lived 9,000 years ago and about how today we should understand his cultural identity.


1988 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 315-322 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Scheibal

The recent AFSCME v. Washington comparable worth case attracted significant public attention when plaintiffs won an initial $800 million judgment against the State of Washington, only to see the award overturned on appeal. This paper reviews the legal theories used by the trial court and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The current legal status of comparable worth is discussed, with particular emphasis on the applicability and precedential value of the Ninth Circuit's opinion for comparable worth cases in other jurisdictions. Analysis indicates that conflicts between the Ninth Circuit holding and opinions in other circuits provide a continuing opportunity for aggrieved employees to pursue claims under comparable worth or closely related legal theories.


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