UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 
_________________________________ 
ELOUISE PEPION COBELL, et al., 
Plaintiffs, 
v. 
)
)
)
)
)
) 
GALE A. NORTON, Secretary of the ) 
Interior, et al., 
)
)
) 
Defendants. 
_________________________________) 
DEFENDANTS' OPPOSITION TO 
(1) PLAINTIFFS' MOTION FOR EXPEDITED CONSIDERATION 
OF DEFENDANTS' MOTION TO STAY THE COURT'S 
STRUCTURAL INJUNCTION PENDING APPEAL; AND 
(2) PLAINTIFFS' CONSOLIDATED MOTION TO CONSTRUE 
DEFENDANTS' MOTION TO STAY THE COURT'S STRUCTURAL 
INJUNCTION AS MOTION TO AMEND TIMETABLES IN THE 
STRUCTURAL INJUNCTION AND REQUEST FOR DECLARATION 
Defendants respectfully submit this memorandum in opposition to Plaintiffs' Motion For 
Expedited Consideration Of Defendants' Motion To Stay The Court's Structural Injunction 
Pending Appeal (Nov. 13, 2003) ("Plaintiffs' Motion for Expedited Consideration") and 
Plaintiffs' Consolidated Motion To Construe Defendants' Motion To Stay The Court's Structural 
Injunction As Motion To Amend Timetables In The Structural Injunction And Request For 
Declaration That The Interior Defendants Violated The Structural Injunction Prior To November 
10, 2003 (Nov. 17, 2003) ("Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe").1 These motions were filed in 
defiance of an administrative stay imposed by the Court of Appeals and warrant summary denial. 
1 Plaintiffs filed a Notice of Errata with respect to their Motion to Construe on 
November 17, 2003. 
Case No. 1:96CV01285 
(Judge Lamberth)
DISCUSSION 
On November 12, 2003, the Court of Appeals issued an order "that the district court's 
order issuing structural injunction filed September 25, 2003, be stayed pending further order of 
the court." Cobell v. Norton, No. 03-5314 (D.C. Cir. Nov. 12, 2003).2 In spite of the stay 
imposed by the appellate court, Plaintiffs immediately filed a motion asking this Court to issue 
its own stay ruling on an expedited basis. See Plaintiffs' Motion for Expedited Consideration. 
Less than one week later, in tacit recognition of the impropriety of their earlier motion, Plaintiffs 
filed another motion asking the Court to rule on Defendants' stay motion by treating it, not as a 
stay motion, but as a request for additional time to comply with the structural injunction. See 
Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe. This transparent attempt to circumvent the authority of the Court 
of Appeals should be rejected out of hand. 
This Court could not grant the relief Plaintiffs seek -- the denial of a stay of the structural 
injunction order -- without running afoul of the directive issued by the Court of Appeals staying 
that order. Plaintiffs have put forth no authority for their remarkable contention that this Court 
may rule on an issue that is the very subject of a binding appellate order, and none exists. The 
structural injunction has been stayed; so long as the stay is in effect, this Court is without power 
to issue its own rulings concerning the appropriateness of such a stay. 
Even if Plaintiffs were correct in their contention that this Court could issue its own stay 
decision with respect to the structural injunction after it is stayed by the Court of Appeals, the 
2 The appellate court's order was issued in response to Appellants' Motion For 
Stay Pending Appeal (Nov. 10, 2003), and effectively made moot a similar motion Defendants 
filed with this Court. See Defendants' Motion To Stay The Court's Structural Injunction Pending 
Appeal (Nov. 10, 2003). 
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grounds Plaintiffs proffer in support of their motions are wholly deficient to support such a 
position. Although less than clear, Plaintiffs' Motion for Expedited Consideration appears to be 
based on the argument that the mere filing by Defendants of a motion to stay constitutes a 
"palpable" (but undefined) breach of their trust duties. See Plaintiffs' Motion for Expedited 
Consideration at 3. Frivolous on its face, the two pages of text in Plaintiffs' motion lack any 
explanation as to how the act of filing a motion could constitute such a breach, and are barren of 
any substantive discussion of the legal issues that have been presented by the motion to stay. 
Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe is no more compelling. A convoluted hodgepodge of 
nonsensical arguments and unsupportable allegations, it is virtually impossible to decipher. See, 
e.g. Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe at 2 n.2 (arguing that the new law is unconstitutional based on 
a fictitious quote attributed to a Supreme Court Justice);3 id. at 4 (alleging litigation misconduct 
by Defendants based on the mere filing of their stay motion);4 id. at 4 n.5 (suggesting that the 
Court hold the "White House" in contempt); id. at 5 (arguing that Defendants' stay motion should 
be construed as a motion for an extension of time because, inter alia, Defendants "did not request 
that [their] motion filed with this Court to stay the Structural Injunction be construed 
otherwise."); id. at 5 (alleging that the Secretary has withheld information from the Court with 
3 Plaintiffs declare that, in the Supreme Court's decision in Plaut v. Spendthrift 
Farm, Inc., 514 U.S. 211 (1995), "Justice Scalia . . . warns that '[l]egislative attempts to reopen 
final judgments represent a direct assault on Article III . . . .'" Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe at 2 
n.2. The language Plaintiffs ascribe to Justice Scalia appears nowhere in that decision. 
4 Plaintiffs' motions are replete with the usual ad hominem attacks that now 
routinely supplant substantive legal discussion in their filings. 
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respect to a fictitious "request to amend by elimination");5 id. at 7 n.12 (arguing that recently 
enacted legislation is unconstitutional based on a press release issued by a Member of Congress). 
Insofar as can be ascertained, Plaintiffs appear to argue that Defendants failed to comply with 
Section IV(C)(5) of the structural injunction order, which requires Defendants to "inform the 
Court immediately if they receive any information that might affect their compliance with the 
[injunction's] timetable." See Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe at 5; Order Issuing Structural 
Injunction at IV(C)(5) (Sept. 25, 2003). This position is untenable on its face. Within hours of 
the President's signing of the legislation precluding Defendants from complying with the 
structural injunction, Defendants informed the Court of the new law and its effect on the 
injunction through the motion to stay. Plaintiffs' suggestion that this notice was somehow 
deficient because it was not in the form of a "request to amend by elimination the timetables" is 
wholly made up and has no support in the structural injunction order. Thus, even if the stay 
imposed by the Court of Appeals did not, by definition, preclude the relief that Plaintiffs seek 
from this Court, Plaintiffs have provided no foundation for such relief to issue. 
5 The false and illogical contention that Defendants have withheld information 
relevant to a motion that has not been made apparently also serves as the basis for Plaintiffs' 
"Request for Declaration" that Defendants violated the structural injunction. See Plaintiffs' 
Motion to Construe at 6, 8. This unsupportable claim should be rejected. 
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CONCLUSION 
For all of the foregoing reasons, Defendants respectfully request that the Court issue an 
order denying Plaintiffs' Motion for Expedited Consideration and Plaintiffs' Motion to Construe. 
Dated: November 26, 2003 
Respectfully submitted, 
ROBERT D. McCALLUM, JR. 
Associate Attorney General 
PETER D. KEISLER 
Assistant Attorney General 
STUART E. SCHIFFER 
Deputy Assistant Attorney General 
J. CHRISTOPHER KOHN 
Director 
/s/ John T. Stemplewicz 
SANDRA P. SPOONER 
D.C. Bar No. 261495 
Deputy Director 
JOHN T. STEMPLEWICZ 
Senior Trial Counsel 
Commercial Litigation Branch 
Civil Division 
P.O. Box 875 
Ben Franklin Station 
Washington, D.C. 20044-0875 
(202) 514-7194 
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CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE 
I hereby certify that, on November 26, 2003 the foregoing Defendants' Opposition to (1) 
Plaintiffs' Motion for Expedited Consideration of Defendants' Motion to Stay the Court's 
Structural Injunction Pending Appeal; And (2) Plaintiffs' Consolidated Motion to Construe 
Defendants’ Motion to Stay the Court's Structural Injunction as Motion to Amend Timetables in 
the Structural Injunction and Request for Declaration was served by Electronic Case Filing, and 
on the following who is not registered for Electronic Case Filing, by facsimile: 
Earl Old Person (Pro se) 
Blackfeet Tribe 
P.O. Box 850 
Browning, MT 59417 
Fax (406) 338-7530 
/s/ Kevin P. Kingston 
Kevin P. Kingston 
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