ward v. race horse

In July 1895, a posse of non-Indians, mostly outfitters, attacked a peaceful band of Bannocks south of Jackson Hole. The Indians believed they were legally hunting elk. But in a surprise decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that state law overrode their treaty rights. In 2019, in a case with huge implications for tribal sovereignty, the court finally upended that ruling. This case too was set in Wyoming, as a Crow Tribe member hunted elk in the Bighorn Mountains.

Just before sunset, on Oct. 31, 1903, a sheriff’s posse and a band of Oglala Sioux families from the Pine Ridge Reservation engaged in a brief, sharp gunfight near Lightning Creek, northeast of Douglas, Wyo. Seven people died, and a U.S. Senate investigation followed.

The brilliant lawyer Willis Van Devanter of Cheyenne made a name for himself in the 1890s as a loyal Republican and protector of the interests of the powerful. He was rewarded with a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court in 1910, where he served as a staunch conservative for 27 years.