Trump v. Barbara · ¶229

The Citizenship Clause used different wording from the Civil Rights Act only to resolve an uncertainty that had arisen out of the Act’s “Indians not taxed” language. Senator Trumbull explained that the category of “Indians not taxed” was an attempted proxy for the Indians over whom the United States lacked complete jurisdiction: The Civil Rights Act was supposed to “designate a class of persons who were not a part of our population,” so it was supposed to exclude tribal Indians while including Indians who “come within the jurisdiction of the United States.” Id., at 572. The former could not be “taxed,” in the sense of personal taxes. See Parts I–B–2–c, I–D–1–b, supra. But, the phrase “excluding Indians not taxed,” Trumbull realized, could be misunderstood to encompass Indians who had left their tribal community and permanently settled outside of it, but were not taxed for other…

slip opinion, revised 7/01/26
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