TRIBAL GAMING IN FLORIDA
A. The Seminole Tribe’s long road to a Class III Compact Despite the long history of operating high stakes bingo halls on its reservation, the Seminole Tribe failed to negotiate and fully implement a Class III gaming compact until 2010 – twenty-two years after the passage of IGRA. 46 On the path to that compact, the Seminole Tribe had to overcome political and legal hurdles across multiple levels and branches of government. The careful balance struck under IGRA included a requirement that the states negotiate compacts “in good faith” with tribes seeking to operate Class III gaming. 47 Tribes were given a specific cause of action under IGRA to sue states in federal court for failing to negotiate in good faith as required. 48 In 1991, the Seminole Tribe wrote a letter to the Governor of Florida formally requesting to negotiate a Class III gaming compact. 49 The state’s initial response was positive, and negotiations between the two parties ensued between March and September of 1991. 50 However, the Tribe and the state disagreed about both the meaning of IGRA and the meaning of state law. 51 As a result, negotiations broke down and in September 1991, the Seminole Tribe filed suit against Florida for failure to negotiate in good faith as required by IGRA. 52 The state of Florida followed several other states’ examples and chose to assert its immunity from suit under the Eleventh Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. 53 Finally on appeal in 1996, the Supreme Court ruled that the Eleventh Amendment barred suit against any of the states, and thus the carefully balanced compromise meant to bring states to the negotiating table under IGRA was invalidated. 54 Following this defeat, the Seminole Tribe sought multiple
the primary beneficiary of any gaming establishments. 38 The statute further emphasized its foundation on fundamentals of federal-tribal relations by specifying that the Secretary of the Interior could disapprove a compact if it violated the United States’ trust obligations to the tribe. 39 III. Indian gaming and the Seminole tribe The Seminole Tribe has a long history of pursuing gaming activities in the state of Florida. 40 The tribe’s involvement in legal developments related to tribal gaming, both before and after the passage of IGRA, led some commentators to speculate that this tribe has played the biggest role in the growth of Indian gaming in the United States. 41 The Seminole Tribe was the first to open a high stakes bingo hall in 1979 and helped develop the legal theory that gave other tribes across the country that option in the Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Butterworth case. 42 The Supreme Court relied directly upon the reasoning in Butterworth when it decided the 1987 case that served as the catalyst for IGRA. 43 The Seminoles were also the key litigant in Seminole Tribe v. Florida , which effectively pulled the rug out from under some of IGRA’s key provisions and undermined tribal bargaining power for Class III gaming compacts. 44 The mobile wagering sections of the 2021 Compact between the Seminole Tribe and the state of Florida continues the Tribe’s legacy as the catalyst for legal developments in tribal gaming. 45 This section explores the history of the Seminole Tribe’s gaming operations under IGRA, including the development and enactment of the 2021 Compact at issue in the West Flagler Associates case.
38 §§ 2702(1)-(3). 39 § 2710(d)(8)(B)(iii). 40 Matthew L.M. Fletcher, The Seminole Tribe and the Origins of Indian Gaming , 9 FIU L. Rev. 255, 255 (2014). 41 Id. 42 Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Butterworth, 658 F.2d 310 (1981). 43 California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, 480 U.S. 202, 212 (1987) (“This view, adopted. . .by the Fifth Circuit in the Butterworth case, we find persuasive.”). 44 Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida, 517 U.S. 44 (1996). 45 West Flagler at *12. 46 Fletcher, supra note 39 at 273. 47 25 U.S.C. § 2710(d)(3)(A). 48 Id . 49 Vicki C. Jackson & Judith Resnik, Sovereignties-Federal, State, and Tribal: The Story of Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida , in FEDERAL COURT STORIES 344 (Vicki C. Jackson & Judith Resnik eds., 2010)
50 Id . 51 Id . 52 Id . 53 Id . at 346 54 Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida, 571 U.S. 44.
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IMGL MAGAZINE | APRIL 2023
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