United States v. Navajo Nation (2009)

The article's lead section may need to be rewritten. Please help improve the lead and read the lead layout guide. (May 2016) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

United States v. Navajo Nation
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued February 23, 2009 Decided April 6, 2009
Full case name	United States v. Navajo Nation
Docket no.	07-1410
Citations	556 U.S. 287 (more) 129 S. Ct. 1547; 173 L. Ed. 2d 429; 2009 U.S. LEXIS 2550
Case history
Prior	501 F.3d 1327 (Fed. Cir. 2007); cert. granted, 554 U.S. 944 (2008).
Subsequent	Remanded, 356 F. App'x 374 (Fed. Cir. 2009); judgment vacated, 631 F.3d 1268 (Fed. Cir. 2011).
Holding
The Navajo Nation's breach of fiduciary duty claim against the Federal Government fails because the Federal Government cannot be sued without its consent.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices John P. Stevens · Antonin Scalia Anthony Kennedy · David Souter Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito
Case opinions
Majority	Scalia, joined by unanimous
Concurrence	Souter, joined by Stevens
Laws applied
28 U.S.C. § 1505, 25 U.S.C. § 399, 25 U.S.C. § 635(a)

United States v. Navajo Nation, 556 U.S. 287 (2009) was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Navajo Nation initiated proceedings in the Court of Federal Claims alleging that when they sought the assistance of the United States Secretary of the Interior to renegotiate their original leasing agreement with the Peabody Coal Company in 1984, a procedural process defined by the 1964 Indian Mineral Leasing Act (IMLA) of 1938, the United States Secretary of the Interior had been improperly influenced by the coal company, and as a result, had breached his fiduciary duty to the Nation when he approved the 1987 lease amendments.