It’s been 30 years since the (quite literally) ground-breaking Cabazon decision by the U.S. Supreme Court opened the gates for tribal gaming, and forced Congress to pass the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) to be able to regulate it.
The Cabazon Band of Mission Indians was sued by the state of California. The ruling said that even in states covered by Public Law 280 granting the state criminal jurisdiction, that the tribes were sovereign in matters such as gaming. The lawsuit resulted from the state’s attempt to close the tribe’s bingo parlors.
The decision not only opened the way for Indian casinos, it created a new field of law: Indian gaming law, which is now taught in universities across the country, such as the University of Oklahoma’s College of Law.
Oklahoma is one of the most successful gaming states. Last year the state collected $132 million from its tribes in fees that it is paid in return for not allowing non-Indian gaming. In 2006, the first year such fees were collected, the amount was $14.2 million. The fees are based on a sliding scale for slots and 10 percent for table games.
Tribes use their share for services, community development, housing, the funding of tribal government. Two years ago, gaming tribes in Oklahoma spent $363 million on capital improvements, which generated 2,768 permanent jobs and $124 million in construction wages paid.
The framework for revenue sharing was created after Congress was forced into action by the Cabazon decision. A year after the February 1987 decision Congress passed IGRA which detailed how tribes could operate casinos and limited what gaming money could be spent for. It also created the gaming compact that so many tribes now have with their states.
More than that, the revenue from gaming gave tribes the ability to function as actual governments in fact, rather than governments in name only. It gave them money to invest in business outside of gaming and to grow their economies. It gave them the ability to create tribal courts and fund tribal executives.
It also helped fund the preservation of tribal culture and creation of tribal museums—even funding the preservation of languages that in many cases had been on the verge of extinction.
