ntly admits their rank among those powers who are capable of
making treaties. The words 'treaty' and 'nation' are words of our own
language, selected in our diplomatic and legislative proceedings, by
ourselves, having each a definite and well understood meaning. We have
applied them to Indians, as we have applied them to the other nations of
the earth. They are applied to all in the same sense."[210]

Later cases established that the power to make treaties with the Indian
tribes was coextensive with the power to make treaties with foreign
nations;[211] that the States were incompetent to interfere with rights
created by such treaties;[212] that as long as the United States
recognized the national character of a tribe, its members were under the
protection of treaties and of the laws of Congress and their property
immune from taxation by a State;[213] that a stipulation in an Indian
treaty that laws forbidding the introduction of liquors into Indian
territory was operative without legislation, and binding on the courts
although the territory was within an organized county of the
States;[214] that an act of Congress contrary to a prior Indian treaty
repealed it.[215]

Present Status of Indian Treaties

Today Indian treaties is a closed account in the Constitutional Law
ledger. By a rider inserted in the Indian Appropriation Act of March 3,
1871 it was provided "That hereafter no Indian nation or tribe within
the territory of the United States shall be acknowledged or recognized
as an independent nation, tribe, or power with whom the United States
may contract by treaty: _Provided, further_, that nothing herein
contained shall be construed to invalidate or impair the obligation of
any treaty heretofore lawfully made and ratified with any such Indian
nation or tribe."[216] Subsequently, the power of Congress to withdraw
or modify tribal rights previously granted by treaty has been invariably
upheld. Thus the admission of Wyoming as a State was found to abrogate,
_pro tanto_, a treaty guaranteeing certain Indians the right to hunt on
unoccupied lands of the United States so long as game may be found
thereon and to bring hunting by the Indians within the police power of
the State.[217] Similarly, statutes modifying rights of members in
tribal lands,[218] granting a right of way for a railroad through lands
ceded by treaty to an Indian tribe,[219] or extending the application of
revenue laws respecting liquor and tobacco o