[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 44 (Friday, April 7, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3402-S3403]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           NATIVE AMERICAN TECHNICAL CORRECTIONS ACT OF 2005

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Committee on Indian Affairs be discharged from further consideration of 
H.R. 3351 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk 
will report the bill by title.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 3351) to make technical corrections to laws 
     relating to Native Americans, and for other purposes.

  There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the bill.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, H.R. 3351, the Native American Technical 
Corrections Act of 2005, was passed by the House on November 16, 2005, 
and referred to the Committee on Indian Affairs. Many of the provisions 
in the House bill have already been acted on by the Senate in various 
bills. I will ask the Senate to pass the bill with a substitute 
amendment which includes most of the provisions in the original House 
version of the bill as well as some amendments that were not in the 
House version. I am pleased to be joined by Senator Dorgan as an 
original cosponsor of the amendment.
  The Senate amendment to H.R. 3551 that I am offering contains the 
following: Section 104 is the same as S. 1484, which passed the Senate 
on July 26, 2005, and it amends the Fallon Paiute Shoshone Indian 
Tribes Water Rights Settlement Act of 1990 to adjust the spending rule 
set forth in that act for the Tribe's Settlement Fund. The provision 
would authorize expenditure of 6 percent of the average market value of 
the Settlement fund over the preceding 3 years. Section 201 is the same 
as S. 706, which passed the Senate on July 26, 2005, and it authorizes 
the transfer of lands, now held by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, to 
the Department of the Interior to be held in trust for the benefit of 
the Prairie Island Indian community in Red Wing, MN. The transfer will 
have no effect on the tax status of the lands, nor will the Prairie 
Island Indian Community be permitted to develop commercial or gaming 
facilities on the land; section 202 authorizes various 99-year leases. 
Part of this section passed Senate in S. 1485 on July 26, 2005, while 
other provisions were contained in H.R. 3351. Section 203 addresses the 
problem of lack of appraisers in Indian country by providing that for 
purposes of obtaining agricultural loans, the market value of land is 
the default appraisal value. This section is the same as S. 1489, that 
passed the Senate on July 26, 2005. Section 301 previously passed the 
Senate in S. 1295 on December 12, 2005, and it authorizes the National 
Indian Gaming Commission to collect fees up to 0.08 percent of gross 
gaming revenues, and eliminates $12 million cap, and subjects NIGC to 
the Government Performance and Results Act. Section 401, like S. 1758, 
that passed the Senate on August 22, 2005, amends the Indian Financing 
Act of 1974 to clarify that nonprofit tribal entities are eligible for 
Bureau of Indian Affairs Loan Guaranty Program. In addition, because 
the BIA is fast reaching its $500 million limit on the amount of loans 
it can have outstanding, and this section will increase that number to 
$1.5 billion.
  The four new provisions that have not passed the Senate as stand-
alone measures do the following: Section 101 corrects a drafting error 
to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act; section 102 facilitates 
exchanges between Alaska Regional and Village Corporations of land 
obtained through the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act by clarifying 
that undeveloped land received by each Native corporation participant 
in the exchanges is deemed to be land conveyed under ANCSA; and section 
103 will allow the State of Mississippi to pay the Mississippi Choctaw 
for work already preformed, through a newly established BIA Trust Fund. 
The final new provision is section 501, the Native American Probate 
Reform and Technical Amendment, described in more detail below.
  Section 501 corrects drafting errors and clarifies and includes new 
provisions relating to amendments made by the American Indian Probate 
Reform Act of 2004, AIPRA, and S. 1481, which was enacted into law in 
December of 2005. One of these provisions is an amendment to 25 U.S.C. 
464. In 2004, this section was amended in AIPRA so that it would 
conform to the new uniform Indian probate code that was the centerpiece 
of AIPRA; however, after reviewing the various amendments that were 
made by AIPRA, which was a very complex piece of legislation, we 
concluded that the AIPRA amendments to 25 U.S.C. 464 was drafted in a 
way that its execution was unclear. So in the 109th Congress, we 
attempted to correct this in S. 1481--P.L. 109-157, enacted on December 
30, 2005, by restating section 464 as it should have read. 
Unfortunately, there were drafting errors in S. 1481 that were not 
picked up prior to its enactment. Accordingly, my substitute amendment 
includes a new restatement of section 464 correcting these drafting 
errors and conforming the statute to the new uniform Indian probate 
code enacted as part of AIPRA. I would like to make the point here that 
the purpose of the amendments restating section 464, both in S. 1481 
and in the current substitute amendment to H.R. 3351, were and are 
intended to do nothing more than to conform the provisions in that 
section relating to the devise and inheritance of lands to the new 
uniform probate code contained in the American Indian Probate Reform 
Act of 2004. As the author of both S. 1481 and the substitute 
amendment, I want to make it clear

[[Page S3403]]

that neither measure intends to affect any of the other sorts of 
transactions that might otherwise be subject to section 464 or to 
affect in any way the application of any other Federal laws that might 
apply to lands that are covered by section 464.
  We are also making clarifying amendments to AIPRA relating to the 
effective date of its amendments and to its amendments to the 
``Applicable Federal Law'' provisions of section 207(g) of the Indian 
Land Consolidation Act. With respect to the former, the substitute 
includes technical amendments to the effective date section of AIPRA, 
section 8(b) of AIPRA, to make it clear that the amendments that were 
made to 25 U.S.C. 464 and 25 U.S.C. 348 are intended to take effect 1 
year after the date on which the Secretary of Interior certified that 
notice of the AIPRA amendments had been given to Indian country in 
accordance with AIPRA section 8(a), and that sections 348 and 464, as 
they read immediately prior to the passage of AIPRA, would continue to 
apply until the effective date of the new amendments.
  Finally, the substitute also makes some minor changes to the wording 
of section 207(g) of ILCA just to further clarify congressional intent 
that nothing in ILCA supercedes or affects the application of special 
laws that relate to specific Indian tribes or the allotted lands of 
specific tribes.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
committee substitute at the desk be agreed to, the bill, as amended, be 
read a third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the 
table, and that any statements relating to the bill be printed in the 
Record.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 3587) was agreed to.
  (The amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Text of 
Amendments.'')
  The bill (H.R. 3351), as amended, was read the third time and passed.

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