CHARLESTOWN — The Rhode Island Statewide Coalition, a local political advocacy group, has joined forces with a national organization that views federal Indian policy as destructive and racist in its fight against a court ruling that would give the Narragansett Indian tribe control over 31 acres.

RISC joined the Citizens Equal Rights Foundation in filing a friend-of-the-court brief supporting the state’s request for a review of the case by the U.S. Supreme Court. A South Dakota-based nonprofit organization, CERF declares federal Indian policy unaccountable, destructive, racist and unconstitutional in its mission statement.

RISC and CERF seek to ensure that equal protection of the law is guaranteed to all citizens and contend that a federal appeals court’s decision to grant preferential rights and status to Indian tribes denies Rhode Islanders and other Americans their constitutional privileges, RISC wrote in a news release announcing the filing.

RISC is a Westerly-based organization that advocates financial accountability and opposes the expansion of gambling in Rhode Island.

A divided 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in July that the Department of Interior could hold the land in trust for the Narragansetts, freeing it from state and local taxes and regulations, and placing it solely under tribal and federal authority.

The property sits across Kings Factory Road from the tribe’s other 1,800 acres, just north of Route 1. It is the site of a troubled housing project for tribal elders.

Chief Sachem Matthew Thomas has said the tribe plans to build housing on the land, but reserves the right to pursue economic development there — if needed. Rhode Island officials fear the ruling would clear the way for the tribe to open a casino or other venture outside state oversight.

In October, Governor Carcieri, Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch and the Town of Charlestown asked the high court to hear their appeal. They argued that the closely watched case deserves consideration because it could affect scores of states and tribes nationwide. At play is whether “a potentially unlimited amount of land” should fall under the jurisdiction of states or tribes. Sixteen states have joined them in opposition, as well as RISC and CERF.

“Were the decision to stand,” RISC president James Beale said in statement, “the [Narragansett Indian Tribe] could be entitled to utilize the new ‘trust lands’ in accordance with decisions of the federal government alone, without any obligation to observe local and state laws. No state gaming regulations, no zoning laws, no planning restrictions, no local sanitation, environment or other restrictions would apply to these ‘trust lands.’ ”

The organizations argue that the Indian Reorganization Act, passed in 1934 to restore certain rights and lands to Native Americans, applies only to tribes with reservation lands that have never fallen under state jurisdiction. Only Congress, not the secretary of interior, has the authority to acquire new territories under the Constitution, they say.

If the decision remains, “all land in the United States is conquered territory ceded by some Indian tribe or still subject to Indian occupancy.”

In addition, allowing the secretary of interior to take the 31 acres into trust for the Narragansetts violates the settlement the Narragansetts reached with the Rhode Island in 1978 that gave the tribe its 1,800 acres.

That agreement — codified under federal law as the Indian Land Claims Settlement Agreement — imposed state civil and criminal laws on the land. The groups’ lawyers say that agreement settled all Narragansett land claims.

“To hold otherwise destroys the intent of Congress in protecting the sovereign interests of the State of Rhode Island to maintain state jurisdiction over the transferred land,” they wrote.

The Narragansetts bought the 31 acres in 1991 to build housing for its elderly members. That project, mired by mismanagement, stalled when the tribe began construction without securing state and local permits.

The state and the Town of Charlestown filed suit against the Interior Department after it agreed to take the land into trust for the tribe in 1998. U.S. District Judge Mary Lisi ruled in the department’s favor in 2003.

A three-judge panel from the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision two years later. The full appeals court backed it again last summer.

RISC and CERF also argue the Indian Reorganization Act was meant, in the eyes of its author, Commissioner of Indian Affairs John Collier, as a temporary remedy “until the Indians were able to become parts of white society.”

RISC contends that the IRA applies only to tribes recognized as of 1934. The Narragansetts won federal recognition in 1983.

They ask the high court to end federal policies enacted in 1970s that “unleashed” federal Indian trust powers on states by concluding that the IRA applies only to tribes recognized in 1934 or had reservation lands, or property specifically given them by Congress at that time.

“The fact that they would have so much control over their land raises many problems for the other people in the area,” RISC Chairman Harry Staley said. He adds: “In other states, casinos have quickly risen where housing originally was promised.”

He notes that the Narragansett tribe recently announced intentions to try to get Congress to repeal a federal law that requires the Narragansetts to seek statewide voter approval for high-stakes gambling on its 1,800 acres. Once revoked, the tribe would proceed with building a destination casino, Chief Sachem Thomas said.

Staley faults federal Indian policy that “allows little nations to be built all over the country. We’re creating a problem — a sovereignty problem.”

“We want Indians to have the rights that every other citizen of the country has, but we don’t want [them to have] superior rights,” he said.

He adds: “We just feel there’s a better way and that’s to integrate Indians into the country in every sense of the word.”

Chief Sachem Thomas said he wasn’t surprised the RISC had filed a brief backing the state.

“We believe they are continually going to fight us,” he said. “The minute we [win a case] it is ‘Oh my God, these wild heathens are going to so something we can’t control. Why don’t they want to sit down with us?”

kmulvane@projo.com