Appellant Brief - Turtle Talk

and the Band believed that that agreement would confer only limited rights to the
State. The Band and State have always understood that this right-of-way conferred
nothing more to the State than the right to construct, use, and maintain the
highway, and certainly never understood the “right-of-way” to confer any
regulatory or adjudicatory authority over actions involving the Band or its
members to the State. If this Court agrees with the District Court that all rights-of-
way are created equal and that this right-of-way falls under the holding in Strate,
then the Tribal Court is forced to take a similarly categorical position: The State of
Minnesota and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (“BIA”) failed to follow the
regulations in place at the time. This right-of-way was therefore not lawfully
granted and is void ab initio.
Interpretation of a contract presents questions of law to be reviewed de novo.
Lamb Eng’g & Const. v. Nebraska Pub. Power, 103 F.3d 1422 (8th Cir. 1997).
This Court reviews a district court’s interpretation of federal statutes and
regulations de novo. See Seneca-Cayuga Tribe v. Nat’l Indian Gaming Comm’n,
327 F.3d 1019 (10th Cir. 2003); Applied Companies. v. Harvey, 456 F.3d 1380,
1382 (Fed. Cir. 2006); Johnson v. Buckley, 356 F.3d 1067, 1074 (9th Cir. 2004).
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