PR: A Sovereign or a Territory or a Possession-US Supreme Court?

Here is the first question in my mind:
Why are tribes in the US consider Sovereign?
- Is it because they had a form of government before?
- So did PR, the Taino indians had a government until the Spaniards came in and the US then came in and took over.
PR was self governing before either country invaded.
A lot of us have Taino indian blood, should we not be a nation also?

During the "Grito de Larez" when PR tried to be independent, the movement was suppressed by the US by bombing the town and killing a lot of the leaders. Yes PR was bombed by the US. This occurred many years before the PR constitution was permitted. In a way the US fought the people of PR and prevented the independence of the island. Machetes against bombs and bullets, not a chance.

Declaring PR as not sovereign in my opinion is going to cause the US a lot of grief with the UN and with the people of PR. Congress having the ability to remove the governor and the government of Puerto Rico if acted upon could result in a revolt where Puerto Ricans will die since they can not defend themselves when the revolt is put down. Even the legal clarification that they could if they so decided, is likely to cause a large discontent in the island, the people were told we had a deal "Estado Libre Asociado" and a constitution.

I do not think this will be ending good no matter which way the judges go, one of the 3 parties is going to cause a big fuzz in my opinion and the discontent is likely to grow and grow.

It is not going to be pretty.

I agree with Rey that things could get ugly. Happens when people think they are getting a raw deal. Worsened by the economic strain  of typical Puerto Ricans, the majority poor people by accepted poverty level statistics. Probably doesn't fare well for Rican-Gringan inter personal relations outside of the tourist scene/gringo enclaves.

The odds of these cases reaching the S.Ct. at the same time as the Debt Crisis are infinitesimally small. Considering they only hear approx.100 cases per year, and most all by choice--very few mandatory appeals--and the docket chosen several years prior to the time they reach oral argument.

A perfect storm? A new dawn for PR?

For those of you really following this litigation, you will be interesting in reading the oral argument transcript from yesterday. It's 72 pages, but court stenographer pages (double spaced, large fonts--so probably only 6-7 normal pages if condensed.

Regardless of your feelings, it'll make your proud to see the quality of the intellectual banter between the court and opposing lawyers who we know aren't always very smart--bench and bar included--but these were. Remains to be seen if I will feel the same after their written opinion comes down.

http://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_argume … 8_5436.pdf

I have a feeling they will end up ruling just on the issue of double jeopardy without clarifying the political status of the island. They seem afraid to go there.

The PR lawyer seem to be ill prepared, there were several opportunities for him to state that PR was sovern before the island was taken over and he did not press the point, that would have stear the question toward the indian nations power.

He also failed to make a clear point how how PR ssovereighty was different from that of Guam and the virgin islands.

I do not know if he will recover from this.

I never did an appeal to any level of an appellate court. Always hired an appellate lawyer, it's a specialty, to handle my losses in the trial court or defend appeals against my winners.

But I have sat thru quite a number of appellate arguments at various levels while my cases were being argued.

And one thing I was always mindful of is the advise often repeated to me by appellate lawyers, from the first one and on. When I would be excited about the questions the judges would ask at Oral Argument, up or down, the advise was the same. Never base your predictions of the final opinion by the q's posed by the court at oral argument. And that has proven to be good advice in I'd say 70% of the cases.

I'd say "Oh man, did you hear Justice Joe push the other side on that issue which is our winning point?" And then the opinion would come out and the appellate judge I thought was 100% with us turns out to be the jurist who wrote the majority opinion against us.

There were a few colloquies between the judges yesterday where they indicated they wanted to narrow the case to the double jeopardy issue and not include sovereignty and that 'can of worms' or however one stated it. Easier said then done.

Only two options re: this case. They can decide the double jeopardy clause of the US Constitution  applies to these US citizen/PR defendants who pleaded guilty in the Federal Court and were sentenced only to then be charged in the local PR court for the same thing. If US S.Ct. rules 'no can do', the Double Jeopardy clause forbids it.  Which would mean, in effect, that PR is not in any way sovereign, and US law trumps. A state can, for example, indict a cop for murder even after he is acquitted of a Civil Rights charge in the federal court, both on the same set of facts. Because the 50 states and the Fed govt make 51 Sovereign entities.

Or the S Ct can rule in this case that the Double Jeopardy clause does not apply and the these PR defendants can be tried for the gun offenses in the PR local courts even after they had already pleaded guilty and were sentenced in the US Federal Court on the same set of facts. And thus this would impale at least the color of sovereignty upon PR.

But assuming the court can 'Word Smith" itself around this dichotomy/quagmire in this case, they are only buying time until they will have the same problem this spring when the PR BK case is up for argument. And that one is more squarely needing an opinion from them on the legal status of PR.

When I was in school, Roe v Wade (abortion) and Brown vs Board of Education (separate but equal is not equal) were two of the main cases that were used to teach Constitutional Law I and II. In years to come, it will also include these two PR cases.

So historical jurisprudence will be made on a matter we all have a deep interest in, the legal status of Puerto Rico.

We shall see. I still think they will rule as narrow as possible and try not to decide on the issue of sovereignty, maybe decide that PR is unable to prosecute them due to some other test.

When are they meeting again?
I find this fascinating.

Thank you for posting this information. I have heard heated arguments by non-legal folks, mostly on the level of 'what came first, the chicken or the egg'.  And, as is common in the world of North and South  America, the pre-Columbian forms of government are never given credence in today's political geography.

Presently I have the good fortune of having a Lakota Sioux Native American man helping work and develop the finca. I read him some of these articles and wanted his take on the Sovereignty of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. He said it was basically a disaster. The reservation has more land than Puerto Rico that is leased out to white interests like cattle ranchers, farmers, etc. the money never reaches the majority of the people. It is siphoned into the pockets of the tribal leaders who usually have a fair amount of white blood and rarely goes beyond that. Alcoholism and teen suicide are epidemic. He has not been in Puerto Rico for much time but he does not see how it could work based on his observations of Pine Ridge. He is part white and has a degree in plant biology so he comes from an unbiased position it seems. P.S. He loves it here and never wants to leave. We work with the basics.

Mrkpytn, I am not sure that being declared a Sovereignty like the states or the indian nations, would in any way change what is going on in the island other than end the constant back and forth about the political status. We already drink to excess anyway and a lot of the lands are not in the hands of the natives or used for agriculture.

dgdlaw, if PR was found to be sovereign (unlikely I know) like the states and indian nations, what implications would that have politically and economically in your opinion?
What if any changes to the relationship with the US?
As a follow up, what are the negative implications?

Rey, It is like comparing Apples to Oranges I guess. I am aligning with some Puerto Ricans here to help initiate a sort of green revolution as was done in Cuba where we can help create a farm to table concept that has been successful on the mainland.

Still don't understand it. Is Puerto Rico still a Commonwealth of the U.S. or what????Will we ever have the right to vote for a U.S. President????





Confused Tonie

http://media.ca1.uscourts.gov/pdf.opini … 8P-01A.pdf

The above is the written opinion of the Federal Appellate Court 1st Circuit , the federal appellate court for PR, upholding the Federal trial court, based in PR, finding that the BK statute PR enacted was unconstitutional.   

How the 1st Circuit became PR's Appellate Court is odd--it is based in Boston and covers 6 of the northern most states--and then also PR. Maybe not odd, but interesting. One would think the closest, the 5th Circuit, would be our PR's Federal Court of Appeals, based in Louisiana, for no other reason then logistics and travel. I am going to check to see which Fed Appellate Court handles appeals from the USVI, etc.

The US Supreme Court has granted PR's appeal from the 1st Circuit's ruling and PR's federal trial court ruling by Judge Francisco Besosa striking down PR's attempt at its own BK law for its municipalities, a copy cat of  Ch 9 of the US BK law. It will hear Oral arguments "this spring--date TBD".  So, written opinion(s) in June/July? And by that time, the Court will have had the benefit of seeing what the plan is for Congress' attempt to resolve the insolvency issues, supposedly to be reported out of the House of Rep's by March 31. The S Ct is much more a political animal then people generally think. If "political" is distasteful to the purists, then how about "pragmatic", even if their ruling does not fully resolve the issues that it was supposed to decide?

The more I think about it, the more I think the Court is going to render its opinion for this BK case and the one argued Wed (Double Jeopardy) at the same time. But only a fool would predict when/what they are going to do/opine.

Various articles I have read this past week try to predict what the outcome would entail. Sovereign? One scholar predicted the scarey implications it would have on PR's.

But little ol me agrees with the majority that declaring PR sovereign is not in the cards in these upcoming S St opinions. It' a legislative, not a judicial, prerogative. I think it is well settled as "ain't gonna happen", not this way at least.

tonie064 wrote:

Still don't understand it. Is Puerto Rico still a Commonwealth of the U.S. or what????Will we ever have the right to vote for a U.S. President????





Confused Tonie

This is how I read it: For now it remains a commonwealth (what ever that means), the judges are trying to decide basically if the power of the laws in Puerto Rico come from the people of Puerto Rico, or from the power of congress because they currently have ultimate power over Puerto Rico and are capable of eliminating the "ELA" contract or modify it at their will. One of the key questions is if it is possible for congress to nullify laws set by the PR legislature, if that is the case, then congress has ultimate power and as such PR has no sovereignty.

It is going to take several months before they render a decision on the double jeopardy case, it is unknown if their statement will or will not have a clarification as to the status of Puerto Rico.

As to vote for the president ..... Not until it becomes a state and that may not happen, I am not sure the US wants to add another super poor state. The people may not go for statehood, specially if they feel they are being toyed with by congress, the president and the supreme court.

Some of the questions being raise in the case are causing a lot of concern, like:
1) Can congress eliminate or change the ELA agreement?
2) Can congress remove the governor or any or all parts of the government of PR even when they were elected by the PR people?
3) Can congress take away the PR people US citizenship?
4) Can congress eliminate or change current and future PR laws to suit their preference?

Due to the 1950-52 creation and enactment of the PR constitution which was approved by the then president, congress and the PR people, none of the above 4 questions were clarified or probably ever thought off at the time. It is possible that the veil may be removed and we just may get to see if the emperor has any clothes or not.

I think there are going to be a lot of tick-off Puerto Ricans when the the results of the case are revealed.

Mrkpytn wrote:

Rey, It is like comparing Apples to Oranges I guess. I am aligning with some Puerto Ricans here to help initiate a sort of green revolution as was done in Cuba where we can help create a farm to table concept that has been successful on the mainland.

It seems to me that you are doing more for agriculture and the "campesinos" than the PR agriculture department."

Way to go!!!!!
Shame to Agriculture dept.

Since the federal government recognizes a "nation to nation" relationship with federally recognized indian tribes all over the USA and grants limited sovereignty to the tribes to allow self governance (this excludes a tribal right to exercise, enter into or create international treaties with foreign governments)  of the tribes on their reservations - they have legal autonomy to pass and enforce laws, tax and spend, etc -  thus the indian nations have a "dependent nation" status within the US.  and so it follows that...

The federal government has a duty to protect and defend the tribal nations from foreign invasion for example (what if, heaven forbid, Canada invaded to take over the Rocky Boy resevation in Montana?) - thus, it seems to me that it would be inconceivable for the supremes to concoct any lessor flavor of "sovereignty" for the commonwealth of Puerto Rico?? 

If so, it would require some pretty tortured logic to come up with anything less - what do you think?

Makes my head ache - but that's what we hire the lawyers for.