So to go forward with this Senate bill it means the survival of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe into the future. We have a small reservation. We have been neglected over the years. We have attempted agriculture since 1900. The Government gave us 1,000 cattle and 100 bulls in 1900 and distributed them to Cheyennes. By 1920 we had 12,000 head of cattle owned by individuals and maybe 40,000 horses on that reservation. The Government said we did it wrong and took it all away from us. In 2 years we had 1,000 head of cattle left and hardly any horses. We started all over again.

We got our reservation fully stocked with cattle again and the Government said no, we were doing it all wrong. They took our cattle and made us sell them and made us lease our reservation for 10 cents an acre. Again, we were down to nothing.

In 1950, we had come back and fully stocked that reservation. We had almost 150 members that were engaged in the livestock business. We had our entire reservation in use. Economically, because of drought and hard winters, that number has been reduced. Today, only about two-thirds of our reservation is available to be utilized.

The reservation is neglected. Portions of it needs to be set aside so that the grass can come back and the weeds can be taken care of. Our streams need to be restocked with fish. We need water. We need it desperately.

If we can find a source of irrigation and put some of these lands into irrigation, we can double our capacity of running cattle by raising hay on this land. Individual Cheyenne will have the opportunity of once again raising his head and being in agriculture and contributing. Our reservation will continue to be beautiful. We will be able to safeguard it into the future.

So far, we have held that reservation together. There is less that 1 percent of the reservation that has gone out of trust and we have actually expanded our Indian land holdings while other tribes have seen two-thirds to 90 percent of their reservations gone. The Cheyenne have been very protective not only of their water but of their land. We were the first entity in the United States to go to pristine air. We are very conscious. Our lands and our resources are not fundable. We need them desperately.

The problem that we face we recognized very early. In 1976, we realized that we need to get our water settled. We entered a suit in the Federal District Court. Our trustees weren't there. They waited a couple of months later and followed suit. We went all the way to the Supreme Court with it and unfortunately lost there. The Supreme Court said that we have to adjudicate our water in the State court.

Legislatively, that would have been a disaster for us to go to State court. The cost of a poor tribe to have to defend against all the water users on the streams would have been too much for the tribe. The equitable way was to negotiate.

Fortunately, the State of Montana has some very, very good people. We were able to sit at the table and point out where everybody could benefit. We need our water, but we don't want to rob it from other people to satisfy our claims. We have lived side by side with our neighbors. Some of them have ranched right below our reservation for over 100 years. We've gone to school with them as

kids, in some cases. We've intermarried with those families. We don't want to rob their livelihoods, but we have to enhance our

own.

The Bureau sat at the table with us while we negotiated with the State. We still put a reliance on their technical expertise. Unfortunately, that expertise does not always help Indians until after the fact and they come in and say that we should have done this or we should have done that.

If you look in the compact, there was a $10 million development fund. That's all we have in that bill. They weren't there saying that there should be an inflationary cost in there. That $10 million isn't going to do you much good because it's going to come in increments. Your dollars 10 years from now aren't going to buy you much.

When $11.5 was introduced and put in with the development fund, we felt that that would take care of that inflationary cost that the Bureau overlooked initially when we put in the bill. We have no qualms about loaning that to Montana. In fact, when it comes back to us in increments from the loan, that gives us a fund that we can maintain and operate our irrigation that are developed over a 40 year period. If it all came in at one time and we developed it, then we would have 40 years of sitting there with no money to maintain and operate. This gives us a great opportunity to budget Federal money and make great use of it. It also provides water that the Federal Government does not have to satisfy our claims.

If they were to provide water from other sources, the cost to the Government to get that on the reservation to satisfy us would be astronomical. It probably wouldn't happen. We would be a race that would be starved out economically, our reservation would be devastated, and we would have no place to go to.

This is fair to the Government, fair to the State of Montana, it is fair to the Indian people, and it is fair to the individual ranchers that live next to us. The devastation and the obligation to the Government to protect the people is to take away the hazard of a dam that is going to be broken eminently. Not only does it endanger the lives of our people, but it also would tend to wash out the boundaries of the reservation causing more legal fights as to where the reservation is because the boundary is the middle of the Tongue River.

A lot of water at that rate of speed would definitely change the boundaries of that river and back to court we would go. The cost incurred in this process would be a continuation of cost to the tribe.

My own focus here is to plead that the Cheyenne have been neglected and hounded by the Federal Government. It is time that they come to the table with clean hands and try to help us.

Thank you, sir.

[Prepared statement of Mr. Dahle appears in appendix.] The CHAIRMAN. I thank you very much, President Dahle.

As you have heard the senior representative of the Interior Department, testify, the major concern has been this so-called interest free loan proposal. Did you or your representatives discuss this pro

Mr. DAHLE. We have discussed it with our own lawyers and with the people from the State of Montana who pointed out the oversight of the inflationary factor of our development fund and showing us a way that it would enhance the State of Montana's position and also enhance our position so that in future years we would have this additional money coming back to utilize.

Through my own perspective, realizing that if I could build an irrigation project today, where would the operating and maintenance money come from. This assures it because it would be paid back over a series of years where we can really plan a development that will be ongoing and beneficial to the people.

The CHAIRMAN. Were the Federal negotiators aware of this proposal?

Mr. DAHLE. I believe they were aware of the proposal, but not exactly of the mechanism of how this would happen.

The CHAIRMAN. Your lawyers

Mr. DAHLE. I'm just a cattle rancher.

MS. WHITEING. Mr. Chairman, as you read the compact, you will know that the original development fund for the tribe is $10 million. That is an amount agreed upon by the tribe and the Federal negotiating team. I might point out that originally the Federal negotiating team proposed a development fund of only $3 million. Apparently the Federal Government valued its trust responsibility to the tribe at $3 million.

We eventually ended up with a development fund of $10 million. Because there was not an agreement between the State and the Federal Government on how to fund the repair and enlargement of the dam that was so central to the compact, the solution that was worked out was to increase the tribal development fund by $11.5 million, a significantly greater amount than the Federal Government had valued their trust responsibility to the tribe.

So under the legislation that is before this committee, the tribe receives $21.5 million, as opposed to the $10 million that is in the compact. The increase represents money that will allow the tribe to make a loan to the State so that the Tongue River Dam can be repaired and enlarged, a matter that is of central focus to the compact and of major significance to the tribe because of the threat of failure of that dam.

The CHAIRMAN. The $11.5 million, in other words, is in operation and maintenance money?

MS. WHITEING. The $11.5 million is money that the tribe would loan to the State in order to make the repairs and enlargement of the dam. In other words, the legislation provides a greater benefit to the tribe than the Federal Government had originally agreed to, the $10 million.

We are happy to hear that the Federal Government is so conscious of their trust responsibility to the tribe, but we would like to know where they were in the past when the issues facing the tribe

arose.

Again, I would like to state that the Federal Government valued their trust responsibility to the tribe at only $10 million. This legislation provides $21.5 million to the tribe. It allows the tribe to make the loan so that this repair and enlargement can be made.

The CHAIRMAN. I can assure you that this committee holds a different view as to what trust responsibility is all about.

Mr. WILSON. Senator, may I make a comment?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes, sir.

Mr. WILSON. As I was listening to the Department's position 1 minute ago, it seemed as if their whole focus was that the State is somehow getting a free ride at Federal expense and that we, the tribe, didn't know what we were getting into or have negotiated away. That's not the case as we view it. We think the view from you folks should be that we have to have that dam. It is unsafe now and it is going to go out. Without that dam, we have no water. That is our future. We have to have a safe facility for our future. The emphasis we think should be that we all are trying to provide some water for our future forever, not the State getting this freebie.

The CHAIRMAN. And you believe the trust responsibility of the U.S. Government should focus upon its responsibility to provide you with water and to provide you with safety?

Mr. WILSON. I do, sir. I think that's what we all ought to think about in this room today.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

Senator Burns.

Senator BURNS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

When we started dealing on this and I would want the record to show that the State of Montana is going to have to pay the money back and that all the money that is appropriated to this goes for the refurbishing of that dam. There is not a dollar spent anywhere else in the State of Montana than on this project, of which the tribe is a beneficiary along with the State of Montana. So I think that's what we have to make clear here, that the money isn't going off to buy candy bars or anything else in the rest of the State. It is invested here and to be paid back by the State of Montana to the tribe.

Edwin, on the reservation down there, do you have any idea-on those lands that can be economically developed for irrigation-are there more acres that can be developed?

Mr. DAHLE. Considerably more if we have the water.

Senator BURNS. Do you have any inventory or idea as to how many those acres would be in your futuristic planning? If you don't have the numbers we can talk about them later, but I think the record should show that we do have room for expansion here if we have the facilities in order to get it done.

Mr. DAHLE. There is considerable acreage that can be developed which really means there is better development over all the reservation because we can subsidize our grazing. Instead of going with 10 month, we can subsidize through hay and grain and double the capacity of the stock on the range units.

So development is not just for irrigated lands. The irrigated lands means that we have the means to develop the whole reservation and enhance it.

Senator BURNS. Thank you very much for coming. We appreciate your effort on this.

The CHAIRMAN. I thank you very much. Does your associate wish to say something?

Mr. PINE. Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank you at this time for giving me a few minutes to say something on behalf of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe. My name is Leroy Pine and I am a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribal Council. I am also a traditional member of the tribe. I just want to say that I am humbly before you. Everything has been covered for the justification of this bill. The only thing I can say is that if these pictures on the wall would hear me, I think they would agree that the water is not only life and livelihood for our tribe, but it is also sacred to us in ceremonial ways. It is more than life to us. It will speak for itself in many ways what water means to us for our tribe and our tribal ceremonial uses.

I would like to thank you for your time.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, sir. I can assure you that members of this committee take our trust responsibility very seriously. We are well aware of the unfortunate and dismal history that we have in our dealings with Native Americans. We will try to rectify that.

Ms. WHITEING. Mr. Chairman, I would like to just clarify one other point raised by the Administration's testimony in connection with use of the tribal development fund.

The compact provides that the development fund can be used only for developing land and natural resources. Mr. Glidden made the point that the tribe ought to have a choice as to what the development fund is used for. I would like to point out that the language in the compact is language that was required by the Federal team in negotiations that went on between the tribe and the Federal Government.

They told us that because this was a water settlement we could use the development fund only for water related projects. We eventually agreed to the language that is in the compact which allows us to develop land and natural resources.

If the Administration is now offering some kind of amendment that would allow us to increase the uses for which we can use that tribal development fund, we would be more than happy to see that kind of amendment in the legislation.

The CHAIRMAN. So the language that we find in the compact was provided by the Federal Government?

MS. WHITEING. That is correct.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much.

Now I would like to call up the next panel consisting of the chairperson of the Crow Tribal Council, Crow Agency, MT, Clara Nomee; the chairman of the Montana Reserved Water Rights Compact Commission, Helena, MT, Joe Mazurek; the director of the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, Helena, MT, Karen Barclay; and the president of the Tongue River Water Users Association, Ashland, MT, Herb Mobley.

It is now my pleasure to call upon the leader of the Crow, their chairperson, Clara Nomee.