ABSTRACT
According to section 3 of the Jurisdictional Act, the Secretary of the Interior had to first approve the contract between the Tlingits and Haidas and their attorneys. Because the Plaintiffs failed to comply with section 3, the court agreed to dismiss the case. Upon further deliberation, the court upheld the standard used by the Commissioner, and the Tlingit and Haida land claims, which began some thirty-three years earlier, finally came to an end on January 19, 1968, with an award to them for $7,546,053.80. It demonstrated that every Alaska Native community could have successfully pursued claims based on aboriginal title, prior to Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. Later that year, the Committee published its report, known as Alaska Natives and the Land. This section allowed the Secretary of the Interior to withdrawal up to eighty million acres for the purpose of adding to or creating national parks, national forests, wildlife refuges and wild and scenic river systems.
