''Ex parte Joins'', 191 U.S. 93 (1903), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that a request for a ''

writ of prohibition A writ of prohibition is a writ directing a subordinate to stop doing something the law prohibits. This writ is often issued by a superior court to the lower court directing it not to proceed with a case which does not fall under its jurisdicti ...

'' was moot, as the lower court case had already been completed prior to the petition being heard at the Supreme Court.''Ex parte Joins'',

Background

In 1893,

Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...

created the

Dawes Commission The American Dawes Commission, named for its first chairman Henry L. Dawes, was authorized under a rider to an Indian Office appropriation bill, March 3, 1893. Its purpose was to convince the Five Civilized Tribes to agree to cede tribal title of I ...

to break up the

Five Civilized Tribes The term Five Civilized Tribes was applied by European Americans in the colonial and early federal period in the history of the United States to the five major Native American nations in the Southeast—the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek ...

by allotting individual tribal members sections of land that previously had been held by the tribe. The tribes resisted this process and in 1896 Congress gave the commission the additional power to determine who were tribal members and allot tribal land to these members based on the tribal rolls that the commission prepared. An appeal of the decision of the commission was permitted to the

United States district court The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district, which each cover one U.S. state or, in some cases, a portion of a state. Each district co ...

for the

Indian Territory The Indian Territory and the Indian Territories are terms that generally described an evolving land area set aside by the United States Government for the relocation of Native Americans who held aboriginal title to their land as a sovereign ...

and the court's decision was final. Both the Choctaw and

Chickasaw The Chickasaw ( ) are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands. Their traditional territory was in the Southeastern United States of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee as well in southwestern Kentucky. Their language is classif ...

tribes prepared their own tribal rolls and presented these rolls to the commission. After arguments presented by tribal attorneys, the commission placed 2,075 on the rolls of the Five Civilized Tribes, out of approximately 75,000 applicants. At this point, tribal citizenship appeals moved to the federal courts. By 1902 Congress, in an effort to resolve the situation, created a new court, known as the Choctaw-Chickasaw Citizenship Court to determine the citizenship issues for the tribes. This court was also given the power to hear a

bill in equity Equity is a particular body of law that was developed in the English Court of Chancery. Its general purpose is to provide a remedy for situations where the law is not flexible enough for the usual court system to deliver a fair resolution to a cas ...

to vacate the decisions of the district courts, which it immediately did. One of the claimants, Joins, then filed for a ''

'' to stop the Citizenship Court from hearing any cases. The Supreme Court granted '' certiorari'' to hear the case.

Opinion of the Court

Justice

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist and legal scholar who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932.Holmes was Acting Chief Justice of the Un ...

delivered the opinion of the court. Holmes stated that since the Citizenship Court had already completed its work on the case, a writ of prohibition could not and would not issue. The petition was dismissed.

References

External links

* 1903 in United States case law United States Supreme Court cases United States Supreme Court cases of the Fuller Court Choctaw Chickasaw United States Native American case law Legal history of Oklahoma {{SCOTUS-case-stub